[LUGSB] What makes Linux great?

[Sean Callanan]

Michael,

What makes Linux great?

(1) As a user, I get treated as an equal by the programmers. That is, 
all programs trust me enough to expose their full functionality to me, 
without asking me twice if I really, /really/ want to do that, hiding it 
in wizards, or simply not displaying it. The source is always available 
and the way the program works is well-known, so I can modify its 
functionality to suit my needs. All the error messages are explicit, and 
don't try to hide the fact that something went wrong.

(2) Linux runs on everything. I have personally installed Linux on an 
Alpha, a Sparc, a PlayStation2, a PowerPC, a MIPS-based laptop, etc... 
The source is available, so I can port it to my own crazy architecture 
if I so choose, even if that architecture isn't used by enough people 
for paying programmers to port the code to make "business sense."

(3) I trust Linux to be free forever and ever from any DRM, if I don't 
want DRM. I trust it never to send information about me anywhere. The 
source is available and there are people like me verifying that it is 
free of these encumbrances. On a related note, I trust open-source 
encryption software to actually encrypt my data properly. I will never 
worry about being vulnerable because of backdoors put in due to 
government pressure.

(4) Linux is free as in beer. If I want Linux on a box, I download a CD 
from the Internet and put it in the CD-ROM drive of the machine I'm 
installing it on, download packages off the Internet (again for free) 
and set them up on my machine. I can run a big Linux installation and 
the creators of the distribution I use will be honored that I used their 
code, rather than sending the BSA to make sure that I paid all my 
license fees.

(5) Community support is absolutely incredible. There are mailing lists 
for most of the software I use, manned by people that really know their 
stuff. People on them have looked at and understood the source code, and 
can diagnose its interactions even with "unsupported" hardware or software.

I hope this helps.

Sincerely,
Sean Callanan