
Happy Birthday, GNU: Why I still love GNU 35 years later - jhibbets
https://opensource.com/article/18/9/happy-birthday-gnu
======
rdtsc
Happy Birthday indeed.

I think there is not enough appreciation how GNU and GPL improved technology
in these last decades. Just imagine how many tools we get as open source today
and expect to be open source - OS kernels, compilers, databases, desktop
environments, browsers, libraries, toolkits, etc. They are not all GPL, but
strongly believe that had GPL and Stallman not been there we wouldn't have had
other open source licenses either and we would have had to pay for most of it.

At the same time I think we are losing a lot of that due to the trend of
everything becoming a service. We losing tremendously in regards to privacy in
general. The other story on the front page today is how Facebook is using 2FA
phone numbers and selling them to advertisers. Yesterday we talked about
Google moving to China where people can and will be imprisoned, tortured and
killed as a result of a company like Google turning over users data. The irony
there is that many of the tech giants that do those things have built their
stack on GNU software (GCC, Linux), can imagine a bit how Stallman would feel
about that.

EDIT: Found this recent 2018 interview with him regarding privacy and what the
tech giants are doing these days :
[http://nymag.com/selectall/2018/04/richard-stallman-rms-
on-p...](http://nymag.com/selectall/2018/04/richard-stallman-rms-on-privacy-
data-and-free-software.html)

~~~
holri
> Found this recent 2018 interview with him regarding > privacy and what the
> tech giants are doing these days

Isn't it an cutting irony that you can not read it without accepting cookies
from nymag.com?

~~~
boomboomsubban
You could buy the magazine...

~~~
solarkraft
You could stop using software to escape its privacy invasion, but I'd rather
not.

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nineteen999
I'm going to go with the guys who said gcc - I was thinking that as I read the
subheading before I read the individual comments. It's just _there_ on every
system I use, or available to install quickly.

I've used C and C++ compilers that compiled code quicker, or compiled it
smaller, or more optimized, that have more copyright notices when invoked, or
take more or less time to install, but gcc is ubiquitous, easy to use and
(mostly) stays out of your face.

The other day I wanted to write some code for an emulator which uses Musashi
(68000 CPU emulator). In about 30 or so minutes, I was able to grab the latest
binutils+gcc source from ftp.gnu.org, build a cross compiler and compile some
code for m68k-elf, objdump it and load it in the emulator. To me anyway, that
is pretty awesome.

~~~
drdebug
I remember times where compilers were hard to come by, expensive and buggy,
most people take gcc for a given nowadays, but it's such a treasure.

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sn41
I think GNU and open source will have a long-lasting impact on science as
well. One of its contributions is that now we can point to computer science
(esp. in areas like cryptography) as an example of an area where code and
methodology etc. are shared openly, setting an example for scientists in more
traditional areas, like chemists and biologists, in becoming less closed-fist
about their experiments.

Going forward, I think we should also emphasize "free data" practices.

~~~
jhibbets
When you say free data, how does that compare, in your mind, to open data? Are
they the same?

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valarauca1
Happy Birthday, GNU.

While we live in an Open Source World, we wouldn't have the world of
Apache2.0, BSD, and MIT that we currently enjoy without the hard fought
cultural and legal battles GNU and its GPL fought and won.

While people may say GPL's time has passed, let them. Their comments aren't
visible to us without dozens of GPL'd systems (linux servers) silently and
faithfully providing the strongest counter point possible just outside of
sight.

------
fb03
Happy birthday to the project that enabled the revolution in computing that we
are enjoying today. Free access to quality code and stuff that helps us all
grow as human beings!

\o/

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enriquto
I'm a bit sad when I read the url of this post.

~~~
51lver
y2k was a long time ago and y3k isn't our problem. :p

~~~
jolmg
It was a good guess. I hadn't noticed, but it's a bit ironic that after y2k,
we're still making our software work with 2 digit years.

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snaky
Considering the crucial role of Linux in bringing free software to the
mainstream, this discussion is particularly interesting
[https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/ksummit-
discuss/...](https://lists.linuxfoundation.org/pipermail/ksummit-
discuss/2016-August/thread.html#3542)

------
dptd
I wonder if GNU project will ever be complete. I mean - the main goal was to
create an operating system, correct? And AFAIK thanks to Linux it was possible
to run plenty of GNU stuff but kernel (GNU Herd) is still not done. Does it
mean that GNU project will never be completed? It's kind of sad if you ask me.

~~~
gnulinux
GNU project was already complete in late 80s -- early 90s. Hurd is currently a
research project with no intention to replace linux. See, GNU and Linux have a
sort of bittersweet history, but no matter which side you are in, if you just
think rationally for a bit you'll realize GNU+Linux is the only future of both
GNU and Linux. Even leaders of both parties, Stallman and Torvalds agree with
this.

~~~
chubot
_GNU+Linux is the only future of both GNU and Linux_

Android is Linux without GNU, so it's not hard to imagine a different future
(whether it's desirable is a different question). Android has no GNU in user
space -- it's almost all Apache and BSD licensed.

And I'm pretty sure the build toolchain is Clang and not GCC.

Though I hope the values of GNU continue to be important in the software
world. Linux and GNU have different viewpoints and I think we need them both.

~~~
pjmlp
> And I'm pretty sure the build toolchain is Clang and not GCC.

Yes, Google took the effort of making Linux compilable with clang, then they
deprecated gcc and with the latest NDK release (R18) gcc has gotten finally
the boot from Android.

