And here I sit
|
| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| DarrenR114 Feb 28, 2007 6:35 AM EDT |
Firefox 1.0.7 on FC3
Firefox 1.0.8 on FC4
Firefox 1.5.0.7 on FC5
Firefox 1.5.0.9 on Breezy Badger Maybe I should think about going back to being a Slacker. |
| Scott_Ruecker Feb 28, 2007 7:12 AM EDT |
I agree, SuSE does the same thing. I was running 10.2 and it cane with FF1.5 on it. What do we have to do to get the major Distro's to pick up the pace a little? |
| bigg Feb 28, 2007 7:24 AM EDT |
I believe that has to do with the Iceweasel controversy and Mozilla's control of Firefox. I have Iceweasel 2.0.0.1 on my Debian Etch machine. |
| Scott_Ruecker Feb 28, 2007 7:26 AM EDT |
Yeah, I do too. I think the whole thing is stupid. Some people (Mozilla) need to loosen up a little. |
| bigg Feb 28, 2007 7:35 AM EDT |
Well, I don't blame Mozilla, after all most of their revenue comes from Windows. I think the Debian folks made the right decision. In addition to the age of Firefox in the repositories, I was also one of those who had problems with crashes. It felt like Windows 98 all over again. I have had few (if any) crashes with Iceweasel. |
| Scott_Ruecker Feb 28, 2007 7:42 AM EDT |
Still, they had to change the name of the thing just to make a license happy, screw that. Its Stupid. |
| jdixon Feb 28, 2007 7:49 AM EDT |
Well, Slackware 11.0 is still at 1.5.0.9 too. :( I expect Pat will be releasing 1.5.0.10 any day now, but he hasn't yet. Fortunately 2.0.0.2 is available on linuxpackages.net for those who can't wait. |
| dinotrac Feb 28, 2007 8:12 AM EDT |
Scott - >Its Stupid. Not so much stupid as unfortunate. The issue was trademark. Trademarks differ from other IP in that they must be zealously defended lest they fall into the public domain. The Debian folks weren't too keen on some of the terms involved in using the trademark, so they changed the name. Still get to use the software, which is free. Might invoke some head-scratching, but not a bad compromise. Certainly better than not being able to package the software. |
| techiem2 Feb 28, 2007 8:56 AM EDT |
/me looks at Bon Echo 2.0.0.2 running on his gentoo boxes. hehe. Given, it's masked, but at least it's available (and seems stable enough to me). |
| herzeleid Feb 28, 2007 9:06 AM EDT |
Quoting: Scott Ruecker: I agree, SuSE does the same thing. I was running 10.2 and it cane with FF1.5 on it.Boggle. (/me double checks a couple of my 10.2 boxes) Perhaps you're thinking of thunderbird? Here's a stone stock SuSE 10.2 install, my mail server in fact: toro: /home/jjs (tty/dev/pts/3): bash: 572 > rpm -qa | grep -i firefox MozillaFirefox-2.0.0.1-0.1 MozillaFirefox-translations-2.0.0.1-0.1 toro: /home/jjs (tty/dev/pts/3): bash: 573 > cat /etc/SuSE-release openSUSE 10.2 (X86-64) VERSION = 10.2 toro: /home/jjs (tty/dev/pts/3): bash: 574 > |
| Aladdin_Sane Feb 28, 2007 11:44 AM EDT |
Just to be weird. I run: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8.0.9) Gecko/20061219 MultiZilla/1.8.3.0a Iceape/1.0.7 (Debian-1.0.7-3) No Multizilla on FF/IW, and I can't argue against the authors reasoning for that. I do agree with those that say that the right solution to the Debian TM problem with Mozilla Corp's FF is to throw FF into Debian's Non-Free category, much like they've done with past "non-free" bits and pieces (I thought that is what it was there for). |
| tracyanne Feb 28, 2007 12:48 PM EDT |
I'm running FF 2.0.0.2 on my Mandriva box. Mind you I had to install it manually. |
| Scott_Ruecker Feb 28, 2007 2:19 PM EDT |
I will admit that I did an upgrade to SuSE 10.2 For some reason I couldn't got it to upgrade FF, oh well. I am running Debian 4.0-testing right now and I have Iceweasel, it is as good as having FF. |
| Sander_Marechal Feb 28, 2007 2:24 PM EDT |
Quoting:The issue was trademark. Trademarks differ from other IP in that they must be zealously defended lest they fall into the public domain. The Debian folks weren't too keen on some of the terms involved in using the trademark, so they changed the name. If I remember the issue correctly, the spat was about both copyright and trademark. The logo's artwork is under a non-free license which means that people cannot modify them. Mozilla does this on purpose to avoid people mucking them up(*). To alleviate that, the Debian and Ubuntu folks always used the globe without the fox. Mozilla says that's not allowed. They say that if you use the name, you *must* use the logo as well. SInce Mozilla wouldn't relicense the logo art or amend the trademark policy, Debian had to change the name. There was a second issue with patch review that violated the trademark policy as well, but that was less important. (*)IMHO a silly argument since trademark law still prevents people from using the logo for their own stuff if it's too similar to the original Mozilla logos. |
| jimf Feb 28, 2007 2:35 PM EDT |
> I have Iceweasel, it is as good as having FF. Only took you two days to admit it Scott :D |
| Scott_Ruecker Feb 28, 2007 2:40 PM EDT |
Quoting:Only took you two days to admit it Scott :D Look here, oh "Chronicler of the Scott" Just cause I have yet to come to terms with the fact that I have to call it "Iceweasel" because I run Debian now doesn't mean that I'm...wait a second...use my words against me will ya.... LOL!! |
| swbrown Feb 28, 2007 6:07 PM EDT |
Trademark issues are only going to become a larger problem as time passes, both from people wanting to add crapware to high profile apps, and from people wanting to package them with modifications to fit the system, or fix bugs that are no longer being fixed by the original project. We need some sort of rules that specify a branch of a trademarked name in a common way yet still can use the trademark for identifiability. E.g., something like "SomeProject Community Edition by SomeEntity" and abbreviated "SomeProject CE" with requirements that it only be named the special name in highly visible places to the user, not all throughout the source and filesystem hierarchy. Done in a common way, users would get used to recognizing the difference. |
| Sander_Marechal Feb 28, 2007 9:59 PM EDT |
swbrown, Mozilla has exactly such a "Community Edition" policy in their trademark policy. But the way it was worded was still too limiting for Debian folk. IIRC it allows people to fix bugs not fixed by Mozilla (e.g. backporting fixes from newer versions to older one's) but does not allow changing other things (such as removing the auto-update feature because APT handles it instead). |
| swbrown Mar 01, 2007 3:47 PM EDT |
sander, yes, but even if the issues are worked out with Mozilla, there'd still be the need for a general solution for all trademarked projects in the future. It's worth thinking about how to go about that now, since it's obviously going to be needed. A one-size-fits-all solution I think would be best, as users would learn to recognize it. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 01, 2007 10:03 PM EDT |
Sort-of like a GPL for trademarks you mean. A boilerplate trademark license that gives us the freedom to hack the applications covered by them without dimnishing the trademark itself. Hmmm..... interesting. It might be worth sending the FSF a message about that. And while you're at it, a standardized patent pledge would be welcome too. Quite a few companies have provided patent pledges but all in their own legalize. |
| dinotrac Mar 02, 2007 3:03 AM EDT |
>A boilerplate trademark license that gives us the freedom to hack the applications covered by them without dimnishing the trademark itself. There is a reason why trademark is the only form of IP that causes RMS no grief. A trademark is merely a source identifier and a quality guarantee. When a car says its a Ford, that means (or should) that Ford made it. It's why Xerox and Kleenex send nasty letters to authors whose characters xerox a page or graba a kleenex. It's why firms must defend their trademarks against falling into generic use. If "to xerox" something is generic, then Funjitsu can make xerox machines. It also creates a problem for the notion of a generic trademark license. If you can hack away on FooBar to your heart's content and still call it the same thing, and everybody else can also do that, then FooBar has no meaning and the trademark has no value. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 02, 2007 6:30 AM EDT |
Ofcourse, but a FLOSS trademark license should allow all the hacking required to fix bugs and port it to different OSes. To bring up the Firefox case again: The license should be free enough that Debian can port bugfixes from 1.5 and 2.0 to 1.0 and also to modify and remove the auto-updater (which is replaced by APT) or installer. The current mozilla trademark license only allows the former if it happens on mozilla's CVS and doesn't allow the latter at all. |
| dinotrac Mar 02, 2007 12:21 PM EDT |
>ofcourse, but a FLOSS trademark license I don't know why. Code freedom is different from rights in trademark. If Debian can hack Firefox code to its hearts content, they should be happy. If they wanted to, they could trademark iceweasel to distinguish their product from Mozilla's. |
| techiem2 Mar 02, 2007 12:44 PM EDT |
heh.
I must say I find it somewhat amusing that there's been such a fuss over the debian renaming of ff to iceweasel yet I don't think I've ever heard a word about the fact that gentoo does the same thing (it disables auto-update and not sure what else) and calls it Bon Echo (at the moment anyhow). *shrug* |
| tuxchick Mar 02, 2007 1:17 PM EDT |
good lord, is this argument still going?? why is Debian evil for honoring trademarks? why why why oh never mind..... |
| DarrenR114 Mar 02, 2007 2:03 PM EDT |
And here I sit ... Firefox 1.0.7 on FC3 Firefox 1.0.8 on FC4 Firefox 1.5.0.7 on FC5 Firefox 1.5.0.9 on Breezy Badger Maybe I should think about going back to being a Slacker. (I posted this just for you TC) |
| Bob_Robertson Mar 02, 2007 2:11 PM EDT |
"is this argument still going?" From Usenet to Web 2.0 collaborative sites. Same arguments, different day. |
| Sander_Marechal Mar 02, 2007 3:06 PM EDT |
Quoting:is this argument still going No argument from me, but I think that if someone were to write a generally applicable FOSS compatible trademark policy for use by FLOSS projects, it would be good to cover the issue so we don't end up with a mass of renamed packages. That would only be confusing to the users. |
| dinotrac Mar 02, 2007 3:57 PM EDT |
>it would be good to cover the issue so we don't end up with a mass of renamed packages. I would guess that most packages aren't trademarked, so the problem ain't likely all that big. The big problem is that no policy can trump the law, and a policy that had the effect of making a trademark meaningless would, in the long run, invalidate the trademark. |
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