Free For All 61
| Free For All | |
| author | Peter Wayner |
| pages | 340 |
| publisher | Harper Business |
| rating | 8.2 |
| reviewer | timothy |
| ISBN | 0066620503 |
| summary | From-the-trenches history in the making, a survey course on how, why and when Free software took over. |
Future Perfect
Free For All's subtitle ("How Linux and the Free software movement undercut the high-tech titans") well expresses the attitude that Wayner lets filter through every page of this book. Wayner writes as if from the perspective of a computer historian 10 or 20 years from now, mentioning casually the tools and methods which allowed (past tense) the Free software movement to flourish as if dismissing in many cases the overwhelming dominance of closed software today. Most desktops, it's true, are running some version of Windows, and despite the popularity of Linux and the BSDs, there are still chickens left to hatch before the count. But in the 1920s and 30s, there were still plenty of horsecarts, too: Wayner proclaims that the internal combustion engine of the day is the virtual engine under the hood of our computers.It's a forgiveable act of hubris, though, considering that Wayner also points out the plentiful high ground that Free software has newly gained, recently regained, or never lost claim to, and it's a convincing list. Slashdot readers, for instance, may know that Apache serves the majority of today's Web sites, but does the average Barnes and Noble browser, even in the computer section, know just what Apache is? This book wastes few opportunities to point out areas where Free software is the obvious best choice, not just a grin-and-bear-it low-cost alternative to something better.
Historical perspective
Wayner sets most of this book in the 1990s -- the reference to Linux in the title makes that a clear and sensible decision -- but makes frequent and welcome trips back in time to temporal locations from the age of Big Iron in the 1960s to Richard Stallman's 1984 GNU Manifesto. To those of us born in the 1970s or later, these episodes serve as welcome reminders of all the history we can learn of only through such means.To that end, the book offers details and anecdotes about the creation of the Unix and Unixlike operating systems that are on the rise now, from the post-breakup copyright battles over the original source code of AT&T Unix to the serendipitous ignorance of Finnish student Linus Torvalds, who didn't know that there already was all-but-the-polish of a free Unix system already available.
It's not the case, though, that the entire Free software community is presented as one big happily family. More like an extended family with skeletons in several closets and some bickering both around the dinner table and otherwise, but for all that a generally harmonious bunch. The issue of licensing, and of hotly debated terms which might seem to an outsider hopelessly semantic, are raised at several points. Wayner contrasts Richard M. Stallman's vision of Free software (whether you see it as humble or grandiose) with the viewpoints of Eric Raymond, Bruce Perens and others. Stallman and the GNU project seem to get the lion's share of attention, with the obvious justification that without the GNU tools, a free Unix workalike would seem like a quixotic dream.
The time-shuttling approach that he takes with each chapter brings a benefit that makes this book an easy one to put down (for a few minutes, at least) -- it means that each chapter stands as an interesting monologue on some aspect of the Free software movement, and can be read as an enjoyable short essay. Taken together though, the chapters don't just entertain and milk nostalgia from silicon: they make a good case for the premise of the title. Ironically (if you see it this way) this means undercutting some of the arguments that Microsoft is a monopoly. Perhaps Microsoft was a monopoly, but the cut is made and the tree is toppling.
Interestingly, among the copious information about the origins and present state of the various BSD projects (Net, Free, Open), Wayner speaks a good deal about the whispered-about (and shouted-about) animosity between OpenBSD project leader Theo de Raadt and the developers of the other BSD varieties. While de Raadt spoke openly with Wayner, and the NetBSD developers seemingly did not, what ermerges is a slightly more interesting picture than I've seen before about this, and it confirms some positive things I've heard about the whole OpenBSD project. (A project which I think has caused improvement in many other software projects with its unyielding security focus.)
Minor Gripes
Wayner's writing is informal -- no stiff upper lip here. That's not a bad thing, but the prose slips regularly into casualisms and jargon, parts of which work better than others, but none so distracting to detract greatly from the story being told. (As if I'm one to complain about that!)The other problem I have with the storytelling in Free For All is the litany of rhetorical descriptions of hackers which are introduced in order to refute them for no clear reason. No, not all hackers have long scruffy beards; Yes, RMS and Alan Cox do. No, not all hackers are pale and anti-social; Yes, some of them are. Maybe its just that I've heard these things said before so many times that it just doens't seem relevant any more. Perhaps many of these "human interest" elements really will fascinate readers who'd not considered them before.
Recommended Reading
Who should read this book? I mentioned that I'm recommending it to my father, for the simple reason that this is one of the few books I've seen which are down-to-earth readable but still meaty enough to walk away from with a satisfied feeling, not like you've just been Dummied.In fact, it reminds me of Stephen Levy's Hackers, in part because it shares a sense of exhiliration and admiration for the people involved, as well as a freewheeling, back-to-the-story-in-progress story telling style. The hackers who make the BSD projects run, and the Linux kernel expand and shrink as code is cultivated and reined in, may be inspired software geniuses. But they share in the unglamorous, painstaking dogwork as well as the glory, and beam a kind of virulent enthuiasm for the cool stuff they're constantly on the cusp of. Wayner gives an over-the-shoulder peek at what that means which doesn't require a C.S. degree, and serves as its own character glossary.
Add this book to the pile that includes Hackers, The Secret Guide to Computers and Open Sources for readable, fascinating, fun computer history that's also relevant for your pointy headed boss.
You can purchase Free for All at Fatbrain.
Re:Original ideas (Score:1)
Emacs
Sendmail
The X Window System
Perl
Apache
Slashcode
Also, I think you have a category error. We're talking about open source / free software (take your pick), whereas "academia" and "corporations" are organizations. Lots of these organizations produce open source software.
Re:"van de Raadt"? (Score:1)
Re:What's under the hood (Score:1)
open mailbox
Hmm. (Score:1)
To put it another way, Charles de Gaul said something like this about France, "How can you run a country with more than 200 kinds of cheese?"
Then, the problem was compounded by the fact that I needed to introduce the topics to people who knew relatively little about them. That meant putting simple, easy to understand anecdotes near the front. And, of course you can't use terms like "source code", "BSD", or "GPL" without explaining what they are. It was all a circular mess for me.
To put it in a geeky way, I found myself with a huge, multi-dimensional non-linear space and I had to choose one axis and only one axis to travel across the space. It was tempting to use the traditional arc of time, but that doesn't work as well in this space. Political and military history is handled well by time because there's only a few people in charge and everythings rather causal. So it's easy to write that first the US invaded Okinawa and then it bombed Japan.
Alas, many things didn't follow from other things. It would have been pretty rough to write sentences like, "And then Richard Stallman shipped version 2.1.2 of Emacs". So I ended up trying to move along the concept axis as much as possible.
So I found myself coming back to some topics again and again in different contexts because they were such touchstones for the movement. This will probably be a bit more grating for those who regularily read Slashdot because many of the ideas are already familiar. You're not like a two year old kid watching TeleSlashies, you're already in post graduate school. But I hope that the extra fill in and repetition makes the book more accessable to everyone else.
-Peter Wayner (pcw@flyzone.com)
For more information on the book, you can check out my FAQ at: http://www.wayner.org/books/ffa/ [wayner.org]
Re:Original ideas (Score:1)
If you are talking about the FSF in particular, I do not think that there exists any other compiler that combines decent optimization with the extreme portability of gcc. It's no wonder that e.g. NeXT used gcc to build Objective C.
I suppost that the idea of building applications on top of a language system (Emacs) also was fairly new and original at that time (and has since then been copied lots of times, e.g. by AutoCAD).
GNU grep for a long time was the fastest pattern matcher available anywhere.
And if you compare the GNU tools (from ls to AWK) with their UNIX counterparts, all of them are more general as well as more powerful (and ususally faster). They put significant pressure on UNIX vendors to improve their tool set (and yet, GNU tools are still superior in most cases).
Often forgotten, but very significant: patch (by Eric Raymond).
And for sheer hack value, Enlightenment has to be mentioned.
Re:Whoa! (Score:1)
Past tense? (Score:1)
I'm a little confused by this statement -- is the book literally written from that perspective or does it just seem that way?
Either way, it seems to me that Open Source advocates ("Open Source", and not "Free Software" used deliberately here) routinely speak from that perspective. They act like they are describing an approach that has been proven superior for both software development and profit. It bears no relation to a reality where Microsoft and Cisco are the largest companies in the world (at least by market cap), where Bill Gates and Larry Ellison are the richest men in the world, and companies based on free software have yet to demonstrate that they can make a profit, let alone make a profit on their own code, not on someone else's.
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Re:Nope (Score:1)
Lea
Re:"van de Raadt"? (Score:1)
Slight editing problem (Score:1)
When the reviewer says OpenBSD developers, I think that he means developers from the other BSDs.
I should have specified: (Score:1)
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Re:Great. (OT) (Score:1)
I've seen it both ways... not that there is a correct spelling for a name that, to paraphrase the immortal Mr. Lovecraft, was never designed for the workings of the human throat. ;)
-TBHiX-j jjjjjj
Besides, who really believes that he'd show up just because I misspsergnisdbvsyrbtkjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj
Re:"van de Raadt"? THIS IS ONLY A TEST (Score:1)
Thanks for spotting that, now fixed. If only I could remember how to spell his name, I could win on final jeopardy in the year 2018. (under "apparently misinterpreted famous software caricatures of evil")
timothy
httpd (Score:1)
--
Free Speech for Programmers and New DeCSS Mirror (Score:1)
http://www.goingware.com/decss [goingware.com]
We now return you to your program.
Please dont mention (Score:1)
Re:Reverse the question (Score:1)
Transistors
Bit-mapped graphics.
Next question?
Re:Original ideas there are many (Score:1)
TCP/IP didn't become popular because it was good, but because it was open. You can argue that a technology will become pervasive if it is open, but you can't argue that the most popular technology is the best.
Few of the technologies you mention are revolutionary; for example, the concept of WWW was derived directly from HyperCard which was a closed, proprietary technology.
Re:Speaking of free books... (Score:1)
Not Pointy-Haired? (Score:1)
So...are we talking cone-heads here, or what?
;)
-J
Sounds Good (Score:1)
BTW, who needs survivor when you got the slashdot moderation system?
Re:Past tense? (Score:1)
They already have. Did you check that Slashdot story about how PostgreSQL trounced Interbase, MySQL, and two unnamed commercial RDBMSs? How much you wanna bet that one of the unnamed databases is one of the default systems deployed in Corporate America?
:::Free for All::: misnomer (Score:1)
Re:NYT article by Peter Wayner (Score:1)
Closed-source books (Score:1)
This book is fatally flawed because its mere existence shows that closed source will always win. This closed-source book on open-source software made it to the bookstores long before Andrew Leonard's open-source Free Software Project [salon.com] was even half done.
</FUD>
Seriously, though, while I expect Free For All and the Free Software Project to compared frequently they are completely different animals. Free For All is a reasonably good, relatively straightforward book about the history of open-source software. The Free Software Project is as much an experiment exploring how books might be written in the future as it is a book about the past.
The only good thing (Score:1)
Microsoft still controls vast portions of the market
Your reference with Sun and Oracle don`t make much sence to me cauz the OS/scripting-language/database you mention are almost all related somehow to your reference.
Not even to think about the `stick your head in the grond cauz there nothing there' idea you seem to have purchased somewhere.
origin of creativity neither commercial nor free (Score:1)
What we see as innovation, in both free and commercial software, is just taking an idea that is not commonly visible and implementing it, or combining a few ideas and implementing them. Napster: peer to peer file sharing + Internet technology. Innovative? Hardly. Here in Ontario, Telus Mobility was considered innovative for implementing Cantonese voice mail. Innovative? Hardly. Most anything you see that is good like that an old idea whose time has come, or an old idea with a slight twist on it.
Personally, I'd like to see a lot more ideas implemented, both commercially and for free. I don't mind if not everyone has access to the latest and greatest; I'd much rather see it out there for someone to use, and the rest of us to imitate or wait twenty years until the patent expires, than buried in a shelf and going to waste.
Not all Americans are that stupid (Score:1)
Re::::Free for All::: misnomer (Score:1)
I thought "Van de Raadt" was a kind of fish sticks (Score:1)
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Re:Again, again. (Score:1)
Still, I think this is better than arranging the book in strict chronological order. It can get downright dull going through 1984, 1985, 1986, etc.
Why must it be a gang? (Score:2)
"van de Raadt"? (Score:2)
Re:Speaking of free books... (Score:2)
--
Scott Miga
suprax@linux.com
Whoa! (Score:2)
When we did the Debian dependency-based package system, there was a lot of new work not in any Unix. RPM came later and copied Debian, you know. I mentioned Electric Fence before - as far as I can tell it embodied an invention. There are lots of others.
Bruce
Re:Original ideas (Score:2)
What has Microsoft done that isn't a "workalike" for something produced either in academia or in some other corporation? I'm asking out of a sense of irony, by the way.
"Many eyes" are not the absolute enemy of creativity -- it's just that genuinely novel (cf. "innovative") ideas are damn rare.
Reverse the question (Score:2)
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Great. (Score:2)
Another reason for the left inside wall of my wallet to get aquainted with the right inside wall of my wallet without all that nasty interfering money in the way.
Damn you, Slashot! And damn you too, Cthlulu, for making me with this insatiable lust for tech history!
-TBHiX-
Any reference to worshipping Cthlulu in the above is purely in the interests of humour. In reality, Cthlulu worships me.
Re:Original ideas? (Score:2)
Another point is that the most important creative thing with Free software (IMO) is not any particular feature or program, but the underlying scheme of massively distributed re-use and re-release. Even if your factory turns out cars just like mine, if you can do it using volunteer labor, have happy customers, and hand out free toolkits (guess I've got ITBWTCL on the brain, but stephenson wasn't the first to come up with the analogy), then haven't you invented something worthwhile, even if it's hard to tell by examining the product in isolation?
Few inventions can't be traced back and called the derivative of *some* other invention; early cars were basically just re-implementations of horsecarts with a little different kernel
idle thoughts,
timothy
Re:Original ideas there are many (Score:2)
Re:Reverse the question (Score:2)
Object Pascal & the entire modern Pascal dialect and series of ultra high-speed compilers from Borland (dates back to 1983, with OP introduced in the late 1980s).
Postscript.
Spreadsheets (started with VisiCalc, which was commercial).
Almost all video game concepts (few exceptions: Spacewar!, NetHack, Empire, Colossal Cave).
Multimedia authoring packages (started with a commercial precursor to Macromind Director circa 1983).
Re:Hmm. (Score:2)
-
So I found myself coming back to some topics again and again in different contexts because they were such touchstones for the movement. This will probably be a bit more grating for those who regularily read Slashdot because many of the ideas are already familiar.
True, but don't be too hard on yourself- You're not like a two year old kid watching TeleSlashies, you're already in post graduate school.
Bah! no dissing the teletubbies!- But I hope that the extra fill in and repetition makes the book more accessable to everyone else.
One of the reasons that I bought this book, was that I find it interesting to follow how much intellegent, well informed non-geeks can understand about computing issues, and to see what information is avaivable to them. It is useful to get a bit of perspective every now and then. Eg, another book I have read recently is "In the Beginning was the Command Line" by Neal Stephenson. "Buy this book, read it, then give it to your boss" wouldn't be a bad plan for a lot of people.Like I said in my original post - I'm enjoying reading this book. I would say that the style of this book works well - it is the kind of book that can chat in an informed manner about kernels, but still be accessible to people who don't know what a modem is.
Excelent book,
many thanks,
G
ps.
MODERATORS: look at the parent to this post. When the author of the book that is being reviewed posts a comment, that is (Score 5, Interesting). Put down the crack pipes and moderate accordingly.
Wait! Don't defend M$ on Slashdot! (Score:2)
-
Ironically (if you see it this way) this means undercutting some of the arguments that Microsoft is a monopoly. Perhaps Microsoft was a monopoly, but the cut is made and the tree is toppling.
Uh, if we stop chopping now, I think they'll find a way to prop themselves back up.US antitrust law is meant to see to two things - that the illegal activity is halted, and that the playing field is leveled out, for competitors who are at a disadvantage due to the illegal activity.
That means that there is a legal right to punish Microsoft for the way they have behaved.
Let's make Bell Gates and Steve Balmer our bitches.
Re:Original ideas (Score:2)
Gnutella?
Actually, even that's probably a workalike for something created in academia. The fact is, that there are precious few new ideas coming from anywhere. Most software from corporations are also "workalikes" of research projects or academic projects. Outlook, Windows, MacOS, IM, all of these are workalikes of some other system developed in the halls of research either in a corporation of academic environment.
Re:Original ideas there are many (Score:2)
Agreed.
To me, and probably to the original poster, "free software" in this context means more than just what is endorsed by Ricahrd Stallman. Most people who pose questions like the orignal poster do not distinguish be "Free", "Open", "Public Domain", and "Academic." Yes, the differences are significant. But an even more important distinction is between closed/proprietary, (you can't see the source, it all owned by a for-profit entity) and these "open" categories (you can generally get at the source, non-commerical use is typically no big deal).
For this broader, sloppier view of "open", my claim holds.
Re:Nope (Score:2)
What's under the hood (Score:2)
Ok, fine, but how many people know exactly how their cars run, or even what type of engine they have? For most people, knowing what kind of machinery makes the thing work isn't really important. So long as the car drives, the web browser surfs, and the world goes round, everything is good. Let the Slashdot readers, the people who actually have to set up the web server, know which ones work well and which ones don't.
Re:Original ideas (Score:2)
It's also clear that programs like Gnutella, for instance, are technically superior in some ways than their commercial bretheren like Napster. Again, these guys didn't create a workalike, they redesigned. Yes, technically they worked for AOL at the time, but I think that AOL's disavowal speaks for something. It was sort of a garage project.
There are also many areas where free software is just better. GNU Emacs, for instance, still rocks. No ands, ifs or buts.
Re::::Free for All::: misnomer (Score:2)
Re:Speaking of free books... (Score:3)
Secret Guide to Computers (Score:3)
PS Though it was mentioned that you can buy "Free For All" at ThinkGeek [thinkgeek.com], you can actually get it cheaper elsewhere [bestbookbuys.com].
Alex Bischoff
Interested in building a roof over your cubicle? [slashdot.org]
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Very good read! (Score:3)
Wayner explains everything carefully so the beginner can understand and the seasoned user can also follow. This is the type of book I would give to a friend wondering about linux, or someone running Windows and dosen't know about the "alternative" operating system.
It also gave me some good knowledge about BSD history that I didn't know before and some in-depth people information about important people in the community. While I knew the majority of the information being covered, it just gave me that warm feeling after finishing the last page.
I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys computers, linux, or anything remotely close. It's not too simple, yet not too hard. Written in a good, strong langauge, Free for All is a excellent read. I have it linked at http://suprax.org [suprax.org]
--
Scott Miga
suprax@linux.com
Re:Past tense? (Score:3)
There's an exchange near the end of "Pirates of Silicon Valley" where Jobs says to Gates "we're better" and Gates replies "it doesn't matter". The shoe is on the other foot, now. Gates says to J. Random Hacker "I'm richer" and JRH replies "it doesn't matter".
The Gates and their descendants will continue to be amongst the worlds richest people long after the last box of Microsoft software is shipped. Red Hat may never turn a profit. It doesn't matter. Free Software is not only morally superior, it is in almost all cases technically superior.
People used to look at the Gnu tools and say "nice, but hobbyists can't write a whole OS". Now they say the same things about RDBMSs, and they will be proved just as wrong.
There will be professional programmers, just as today there are professional musicians and professional athletes. We will find a away to pay them because we value what they do. Closed source will be as absurd a concept as a copyrighted touchdown.
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Again, again. (Score:3)
I'm reading it for a bit more of the human background to open source, and I'm enjoying it. But... for any software engineers out there, it reads like a waterfall development model. It seems to introduce a new idea, then go back, then explore the new idea in the next chapter, where it will kindof introduce stuff from the chapter after it. It seems to loop around somewhat.
There is just something about the style of the book, that makes me thing I'm watching an episode of Teletubbies.
Eh, maybe it's just my bad. Maybe I'm getting forgetful in my old age, and just keep reading over the same bits :-)
Re:Original ideas there are many (Score:3)
TCP/IP
the concept of WWW was derived directly from HyperCard. er,um, kinda. At the time, a lot of "hypertext" ideas were in the air. Remember Xanadu? hypercard was certainly closed, and definitely predated html -- but WWW also owed something to gopher and WAIS, which I believe were non-proprietary.
Few of the technologies you mention are revolutionary Well, perhaps. By this high standard, almost no software ideas have been revolutionary since, oh, Babbage. Could you please suggest what you do consider revolutionary, and decide whether or not it was proprietary?
Original ideas (Score:3)
Enlightened Self Interest (Score:3)
I like to see books like this. Free software not only has its utility value... I think it also has cultural values which might help us to play fewer zero-sum games with one another.
One of the ideas that I'm constantly wondering about is that productivity is mainly fueled by greed. I won't deny that sometimes it is, but I get worried about reducing it to that equation, which is what happens sometimes when I'm talking to those who favor very hands-off/invisible hand economics (and frankly, I plan to tell my children that the invisible hand is something like Santa Claus). I think it's ideas like this that get us into some of the trouble we have today... see if you can think of a few recent legal cases where profit and greed come up against individual rights...
One of the things that I like very much about the free software community, is that its existence is a strong refutation of the idea that greed = productivity. People create software because they like to. The fact that they recognize that their contributions may be useful to others and benefit them doesn't change this... along with throwing out greed = productivity, you also get altruism included in self-interest (whether or not RMS and ESR can get along).
Just some thoughts...
Who pays the piper, calls the tune. (Score:4)
The motivation for this sort of selective-history is the stock value of the business at hand. Shareholders like to believe in the myth of the Strong Man At The Helm, the alpha-figure who will enrich them and in whom they can trust. They don't like to be reminded about the pale, wan, tempermental and a-social geniuses that are actually the ones to credit (or blame) for a high-tech's fate.
Free Software doesn't have this burden of mercenary mythology.
Re:"van de Raadt"? (Score:4)
NYT article by Peter Wayner (Score:5)
(don't forget that if you want to avoid NYT registration there's always username:cypherpunks, password:cypherpunks)
Original ideas there are many (Score:5)
The Internet
Internet Explorer. IE started life as Mosaic, one of the original browsers. Like all of the origninal browsers, Mosaic was open source. Microsoft bought the browser idea from its Open Source inventors.
Apache. [apache.org] This is the direct descendant of the original web server (it too was open source), and it dominates [netcraft.com] the web. Microsoft has tried to copy Apache's functions, but has had a tough time keeping up with Apache's pace of innnovation.
sendmail [sendmail.com] . Essentially all of the email that goes across the internet does so thanks to sendmail. The orginal (open source) developers now also run a company, but the orignal accomplishments all happened open-source.
BIND [isc.org] The Internet works on IP addresses (eg. 135.23.43.121). Any time you type a URL (letters) into your browswer, you are using BIND. This was invented open source (the B is for Berkely).
TCP/IP These are the two protocols (among others) that make the internet possible. In a sense, they define what is "internet." Developed and implemented open source
Eric Raymond addresses "creativity" issues in his essays [tuxedo.org].