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Re: OT Re: Hebrew & Linux from IBM?



On Sun, Nov 25, 2001, Hetz Ben Hamo wrote about "Re: OT Re: Hebrew & Linux from IBM?":
>...
> True - GNU stuff was available before Linux, just like the *BSD stuff was 
> before Linux available - but once Linux became wildly acceptible and popular 
> - there has been MUCH more GNU stuff.
> If there wasn't linux, was there any new GCC? GNOME? GRUB? I doubt. Lets face 
> it - Linux popularity introduced to many people the GNU applications and 

Not true... Almost all Gnu software, except perhaps GNOME, was very much
alive before Linux. Emacs, Gcc, Gdb, Bash, Groff, GNU make, bison, fileutils,
just as a few examples, and non-gnu stuff like Ghostscript, Tex, X-Windows,
TCL/TK and much much more - all predated Linux, and were actively developed.
When Linux came along, all Linus had to write was a Kernel (and port a few
applications) - everything else was already ready.

If I remember correctly, even Gtk (or more accurately, Gimp) started before
Linux got popular. I remember using some initial version of Gimp on an SGI
Unix (Irix) machine around 1995 (I think - don't shoot me if I'm wrong) -
after Linux existed but before it was popular, and it certainly wasn't the
reason why GIMP (or anything) was written.

> stuff. When I started with Linux (circa 1995 or so) the only thing I heard 
> about GNU tools - was GNU HURD (0.09 if I'm not mistaken) and it's not 
> because I was an MS freak - I programmed all the 8 bit processors and played 
> with Mac/Amiga/Atari machines and never heard GNU tools from them...

Well, it certainly doesn't mean they didn't exist... I first heard of
Stallman's Emacs in 1985 (though I didn't use it - my favorites were VI and
AT&T's "sam". Even back then there was a Emacs/VI religious war, except
for the "weirdos" who were still using 'ed' ;) ).
Linus was probably blissfully ignorant about operating systems at the time :)

Remember, in the 80's and parts of the 90's, most people didn't care about
free O/S's. Most hardware (VAX, Sun, SGI, Dec, HP, etc.) came with their
own O/S (usually a Unix clone) included in the price, and people didn't mind
writing portable free software on these non-free OSs, and indeed they wrote
a lot (relatively) of free software. Only with the strong PCs came the problem
that we had good hardware with no good (read: Unix-like) OS bundled with it,
which is why Linux (or FreeBSD, etc.) was needed.

> This really reminds me - does anyone here uses OSF/1 OS, Alpha and Mozilla? 
> is the hebrew the same as the Linux version of mozilla?

I didn't try (it's been a year since I last installed somthing on an Alpha
machine), but why not? Everything IBM did should also work on other Unix
clones, and even BSD derivatives. All the more reason to call these Hebrew
support for GNU systems (or maybe just "unix-like systems"), rather than
Linux systems ;)

P.S. OSF/1 is no longer this OS's name. It was changed to "Digital Unix",
and later into "Tru64 Unix". And don't even get me started on who owns
DEC now, and how it's called - it's hard to keep track :)

-- 
Nadav Har'El                        |      Monday, Nov 26 2001, 11 Kislev 5762
nyh@math.technion.ac.il             |-----------------------------------------
Phone: +972-53-245868, ICQ 13349191 |Creativity consists of coming up with
http://nadav.harel.org.il           |many ideas, not just that one great idea.

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