[Gllug] GLLUG ->Gnu Linux London Users Group

[Nick Hill]

The issue is not about exclusion. It is not a matter of excluding those who use operating systems other than GNU or whose kernel is not Linux.

I don't think anyone should be excluded. If they are interested in what we are doing, then it should be fine. 

However, most of what we discuss is to do with the GNU operating system whose kernel happens to be, most of the time, Linux. 

It is reasonable, therefore, for the operating system name to be referred to, especially since the philosophy which brought us GNU/Linux and has given us a free alternative to proprietary software would benefit from such simple lip service.

Most of the systems you refer to do use GNU software. I have just logged on to a BSD machine which uses bash- an important GNU application. Many of the systems you refer to use te GCC compiler. Another core GNU application.

 


On Sun, 17 Feb 2002 20:05:40 +0000
Dan Kolb <dankolb at ox.compsoc.net> wrote:

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> On Sunday 17 Feb 2002 19:53 pm, Nick Hill wrote:
> > > This is a battle that has been lost, in the wider world and on this
> >
> > The battle is only lost when your beliefs in what is right and good die.
> > The battle has just begun.
> 
> It's just a name. Why not the "Greater London Unix and Unix-Like Operating 
> Systems Users Groups" (GLUULOSUG)? I'm sure there's people on this list who 
> use Solaris and/or the *BSDs. Does this mean that they wouldn't be welcome at 
> meetings, just because Gllug is currently the GL *Linux* UG? Similarly, how 
> many people here are *not* from the Greater London area? I would guess at 
> quite a few.
> 
> Doesn't calling it a GNU/Linux users group discriminate against people who 
> use Perl/Linux (there was the project to write all the user-land tools in 
> Perl, wasn't there?), or maybe even some people who've ported the BSD 
> userland to Linux?
> 
> I would guess that most, if not all, people who use Linux on their desktop, 
> use X. A lot of those people quite possibly use KDE, that's built on top of 
> QT from Trolltech. Should they be using Troll/X/GNU/Linux? What about if they 
> use StarOffice under KDE? (Which, IMHO, would be a perfectly standard use in 
> most office situations.) Sun/Troll/X/GNU/Linux?
> 
> If we use tools in the Cygwin environment to do most of our work under 
> Windows, should we then call it GNU/Windows?
> 
> My beliefs in what's right and good are not altered by names. I couldn't care 
> if Richard Stallman called his organisation AOL/Time-Warner/GNU. As long as 
> it stood for the same principles as always, I'd be happy.
> 
> Hmm...this post didn't really go anywhere, did it?
> 
> Dan
> - -- 
> dankolb at ox.compsoc.net  
>  
> - --I reserve the right to be completely wrong about any comments or
>   opinions expressed; don't trust everything you read above--  
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