[Info-vax] BASIC compiler in the hobbyist distribution

[johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk]

On Monday, 1 June 2015 13:28:31 UTC+1, Bill Gunshannon  wrote:
> In article <556b77b7$0$1514$c3e8da3$12bcf670 at news.astraweb.com>,
> 	JF Mezei <jfmezei.spamnot at vaxination.ca> writes:
> > On 15-05-31 15:56, David Froble wrote:
> > 
> >> I guess I can have some specific opinions about "free" software.  Mostly 
> >> because it isn't from the world I'm used to.
> > 
> > 
> > Ex Squeeze me ?
> > 
> > A large part of DEC's marketing was based on the DECUS user group and
> > availability of software through the DECUS library: FREE SOFTWARE.
> 
> And Unix had USENIX and the Usenet Source groups.
> 
> > 
> > t was an advantage DEC had to a far greater extent than competitors such
> > as IBM, Data General etc.
> 
> Can't speak for DG but IBM had (and still has) a very active User Group.
> So did Primos.  And even UCSD-Pascal and CP/M.  DECUS did not corner that
> market.
> 
> > 
> > The same mentality which drove the DECUS Library also drove the "open"
> > Linux  and all the open software today.
>  
> Hogwash.  In the "good ole dayz" this "FREE" software was written by
> and maintained by professionals.  Not by by pre-pubescent teenagers
> with no girlfriends, living in their mom's basement. 
>  
> bill
> 
> -- 
> Bill Gunshannon          |  de-moc-ra-cy (di mok' ra see) n.  Three wolves
> billg999 at cs.scranton.edu |  and a sheep voting on what's for dinner.
> University of Scranton   |
> Scranton, Pennsylvania   |         #include <std.disclaimer.h>

Bill's vision of who writes Linux doesn't necessarily match the rest
of the world's. For a start, it's in large part now written by (and
hopefully some of it is even tested and maintained by) employees of
big name corporations, in company time. Much of the rest comes from
less well known companies.

"coders who claimed no company affiliation, or for whom an affiliation
could not be determined, accounted for just 16.4 per cent of the total
number of contributions to the kernel. Independent consultants made up
another 2.5 per cent.

The rest all came from coders working on behalf of companies large and
small. And while individual contributors seldom made a huge impact on
the kernel - most made ten or few changes to the kernel over the last
three years - their combined efforts made a huge difference.
[snip]
The report cites Intel, Samsung, IBM, Google, Huawei, Red Hat,
Freescale, Linaro, Texas Instruments, Marvell, and Nvidia as being
particularly active in bringing new developers into the fold, in that
order."
from
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/02/18/who_writes_linux_2015/
which comes in turn from
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/publications/linux-foundation/who-writes-linux-2015 (free registration required)