On Fri, 7 Jan 2005, Christian Henz wrote: > The point is that OSS, whatever version, is not going to be the > standard sound layer on Linux, if not for technichal reasons then for > political ones. And what are the political reasons? Everybody knows (or at least should know) that in the beginning Linux was an attempt to create a 1:1 compatibble version of the Unix (or Posix/whatever) API, utilities, etc. Were there any political problems with this? No, there were no political problems at all. In fact Linux has always been seen as a politically important project. X11 has been an open source product with closed source versions shipped by various computer vendors. Were there any political problems when X was ported to Linux? No. There were no political problems with this. OSS is another open source project with an alternative closed source version. Are there any political problems? Surprise surprise there are political problems. There are BIG political problems. Big enough to start a jihad against OSS. Since the announcement of the commercial OSS alternative also the freeware OSS version has been contaminated. So it must be removed from the kernel and replaced by another interface that is free from anything that looks, smells or tastes like OSS. Even if creating this alternative driver is going to take takes 7 years (or more) of time (*). Do you see any logic there? (*) It was 7 years ago when the Linux Ultra Sound project (http://www.perex.cz/~perex/ultra/) was renamed to ALSA. It's pity that Jaroslav has removed that fearless announcement from the Ultra project page. Best regards, Hannu ----- Hannu Savolainen (hannu@xxxxxxxxxxxxx) http://www.opensound.com (Open Sound System (OSS)) http://www.compusonic.fi (Finnish OSS pages) OH2GLH QTH: Karkkila, Finland LOC: KP20CM
