From 0a55037bc349ec97793212f860073886326461e3 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: speedie Date: Tue, 23 May 2023 11:43:19 +0200 Subject: [PATCH] fix updates xml, add new blog post --- articles/post58.php | 28 +++++++++++++++++++++ blog.php | 3 ++- rss.xml | 17 +++++++++++++ updates.xml | 59 --------------------------------------------- 4 files changed, 47 insertions(+), 60 deletions(-) create mode 100644 articles/post58.php diff --git a/articles/post58.php b/articles/post58.php new file mode 100644 index 0000000..65348ec --- /dev/null +++ b/articles/post58.php @@ -0,0 +1,28 @@ + + + + +Swedish man rants about licenses again + + + + + + +
+

Swedish man rants about licenses again

+

2023-05-23

+

It is no secret that I strongly believe in copyleft licenses like the GNU General Public License (often shortened to GNU GPL or GPL) and the Mozilla Public License (MPL). Copyleft licenses as the name implies are the opposite of copyright licenses. With copyleft licenses, the user has the freedom to modify, study and distribute the software and source code. But unfortunately in recent years copyleft licenses have fallen out of favor thanks to tech companies like Microsoft heavily pushing too permissive licenses to developers. These licenses (which I will call 'cuck licenses' from now on) rob developers of their work. Now, it should probably be noted that I am not a lawyer, nor am I more experienced in any legal system that most people. I'm just here to talk about the best software license today.

+

With cuck licenses, the developer writes the code and puts it out on the internet like usual. The difference is there is nothing that prevents anyone from forking it and changing the license. You might ask why this matters. It matters because big tech companies like Microsoft, Google, Apple, Nvidia, Meta, and many more will take these free software projects, change the license to a nonfree license and no longer distribute the source code for the software. Most of these cuck licenses only require that the license notice is kept in every piece of code. However you're only distributing a binary though, the license isn't noticeable anyway.

+

I'm sure you can tell by now, but tech companies LOVE cuck licensers, because cuck licensers do the work for them and for free. The companies then just steal that source code and make their own proprietary variant. No attribution, no money, nothing. Some developer writes the code for free and a big tech company will steal it and make a nonfree spyware variant of it. When tech companies write software, they will usually license their own software too under the BSD licenses or more commonly, the MIT license. The MIT license is probably one of the worst licenses out there in terms of stripping the developer of his/her freedom. The user still has the freedom to use, study and modify the software. That is, until a tech company forks the project and changes the license to a nonfree one.

+

An example of a bad case of cuck licensing is MINIX, a portable UNIX like operating system. Because this project is cuck licensed, Intel decided to fork the project, apply some spyware modifications to it and relicense it under a proprietary license so no one knows what the code really does. Now all Intel users have this backdoor in their computer in what's called the Intel Management Engine (ME). Or take Google Chrome. Google forked the Webkit engine and made their own web engine called Blink. The Chromium browser which implements this engine is free software, but Google Chrome (which is very similar) is a nonfree program which does god knows what.

+

But you, the developer can fight back against this by licensing your software under a copyleft license. Copyleft licenses usually require that the forked software is licensed under the same license. So if you license your software under the GNU General Public License version 3, all copies of the software including forks are going to be licensed under that same license. This is great for developers because their code is always used for free software and not nonfree software. It's also great for users, as it means there will be less nonfree software to use and more free software to use instead.

+

I should note that I switched all software I've written from scratch to the GNU General Public License version 3 about a year ago or so from the MIT license and it gives me more freedom, and it also means everyone who uses my software or forks of my software is guaranteed freedom. It's a win for everybody, and it means together we're working towards a more free computing experience for everyone. It has its flaws though, which is why some may consider the LGPL or Lesser General Public License. This license unlike the regular GPL allows embedding the software in proprietary programs. This may actually be preferable in some cases, but in general you should stick to the regular GPL. I know there are more licenses than the GPL and MPL, but I'm not going to get into license specifics too much here. I'm mainly talking about the GPL because that's what I license all my software under.

+

Conclusion then. Cuck licensers write the software for big tech companies for free. They get nothing in return and users get a piece of crap proprietary program when the big company forks the originally free software program. With copyleft licenses on the other hand, the user is guaranteed the freedom to modify, study and distribute the source code or program. Switch to the GNU GPL today or any of the other GPL compatible copyleft licenses and truly become a free software computer programmer.

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+ + + + diff --git a/blog.php b/blog.php index 7a03823..563cd54 100644 --- a/blog.php +++ b/blog.php @@ -13,7 +13,7 @@

Blog

I repost some of my RSS feed articles/posts here sometimes. This is a view of all of them.

NOTE: You can see all of them using my RSS feed.

-

Latest blog post

+

Latest blog post

Feeds

This is a list of feeds containing the complete list of blog posts. You can add any of these to your RSS reader and read at any time, provided you have an internet connection.

If you do not have a reader, install newsboat with your GNU/Linux distribution's package manager.

@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@

Articles

Posts 50-59

+
Swedish man rants about licenses again, written 2023-05-23
Ungoogled Chromium: The best browser for most people, written 2023-05-01
Why I don't use Wayland (and how it can be improved), written 2023-04-28
Dear bloggers: Your RSS feeds suck., written 2023-04-19
diff --git a/rss.xml b/rss.xml index f418de7..a52011b 100644 --- a/rss.xml +++ b/rss.xml @@ -484,5 +484,22 @@ ]]> + + Swedish man rants about licenses again + https://speedie.site/articles/post58.php + https://speedie.site/articles/post58.php + Tue, 23 May 2023 00:00:00 +0100 + + It is no secret that I strongly believe in copyleft licenses like the GNU General Public License (often shortened to GNU GPL or GPL) and the Mozilla Public License (MPL). Copyleft licenses as the name implies are the opposite of copyright licenses. With copyleft licenses, the user has the freedom to modify, study and distribute the software and source code. But unfortunately in recent years copyleft licenses have fallen out of favor thanks to tech companies like Microsoft heavily pushing too permissive licenses to developers. These licenses (which I will call 'cuck licenses' from now on) rob developers of their work. Now, it should probably be noted that I am not a lawyer, nor am I more experienced in any legal system that most people. I'm just here to talk about the best software license today.

+

With cuck licenses, the developer writes the code and puts it out on the internet like usual. The difference is there is nothing that prevents anyone from forking it and changing the license. You might ask why this matters. It matters because big tech companies like Microsoft, Google, Apple, Nvidia, Meta, and many more will take these free software projects, change the license to a nonfree license and no longer distribute the source code for the software. Most of these cuck licenses only require that the license notice is kept in every piece of code. However you're only distributing a binary though, the license isn't noticeable anyway.

+

I'm sure you can tell by now, but tech companies LOVE cuck licensers, because cuck licensers do the work for them and for free. The companies then just steal that source code and make their own proprietary variant. No attribution, no money, nothing. Some developer writes the code for free and a big tech company will steal it and make a nonfree spyware variant of it. When tech companies write software, they will usually license their own software too under the BSD licenses or more commonly, the MIT license. The MIT license is probably one of the worst licenses out there in terms of stripping the developer of his/her freedom. The user still has the freedom to use, study and modify the software. That is, until a tech company forks the project and changes the license to a nonfree one.

+

An example of a bad case of cuck licensing is MINIX, a portable UNIX like operating system. Because this project is cuck licensed, Intel decided to fork the project, apply some spyware modifications to it and relicense it under a proprietary license so no one knows what the code really does. Now all Intel users have this backdoor in their computer in what's called the Intel Management Engine (ME). Or take Google Chrome. Google forked the Webkit engine and made their own web engine called Blink. The Chromium browser which implements this engine is free software, but Google Chrome (which is very similar) is a nonfree program which does god knows what.

+

But you, the developer can fight back against this by licensing your software under a copyleft license. Copyleft licenses usually require that the forked software is licensed under the same license. So if you license your software under the GNU General Public License version 3, all copies of the software including forks are going to be licensed under that same license. This is great for developers because their code is always used for free software and not nonfree software. It's also great for users, as it means there will be less nonfree software to use and more free software to use instead.

+

I should note that I switched all software I've written from scratch to the GNU General Public License version 3 about a year ago or so from the MIT license and it gives me more freedom, and it also means everyone who uses my software or forks of my software is guaranteed freedom. It's a win for everybody, and it means together we're working towards a more free computing experience for everyone. It has its flaws though, which is why some may consider the LGPL or Lesser General Public License. This license unlike the regular GPL allows embedding the software in proprietary programs. This may actually be preferable in some cases, but in general you should stick to the regular GPL. I know there are more licenses than the GPL and MPL, but I'm not going to get into license specifics too much here. I'm mainly talking about the GPL because that's what I license all my software under.

+

Conclusion then. Cuck licensers write the software for big tech companies for free. They get nothing in return and users get a piece of crap proprietary program when the big company forks the originally free software program. With copyleft licenses on the other hand, the user is guaranteed the freedom to modify, study and distribute the source code or program. Switch to the GNU GPL today or any of the other GPL compatible copyleft licenses and truly become a free software computer programmer.

+ ]]> + + diff --git a/updates.xml b/updates.xml index 90b3e79..ea8846f 100644 --- a/updates.xml +++ b/updates.xml @@ -4,65 +4,6 @@ https://speedie.site/project-list.php RSS feed for updates on my projects. - - spmenu 0.3.2 release - https://spmenu.speedie.site - post1 - Sun, 26 Mar 2023 00:00:00 +0100 - - spmenu 0.3.2 was just released. It adds a few example scripts, powerline drawing and importantly fixes quite a few bugs. Other than that though, it's not a very interesting release. The project is increasingly stable now, and other than what's listed in the TODO (and dynamic updating), I'm pretty much done with it.

-

If you are on Arch or Gentoo, you can update using my repositories. Otherwise just clone it/git pull.

- ]]> - - - - spmenu 0.4 release - https://spmenu.speedie.site - post2 - Mon, 10 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0100 - - spmenu 0.4 was just released. It completely rewrites configuration files, fixes a lot of bugs, and adds support for profiles. Check it out here.

- ]]> - - - - spmenu 0.4.1 release - https://spmenu.speedie.site - post3 - Fri, 14 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0100 - - spmenu 0.4.1 was just released. It's a very minor update, but in order to update speedwm-spde and spde packages, I had to get this out. It is mainly a bug fix update, but merges spmenu_desktop with spmenu_run. It also adds a nice file managing feature (-fm) flag to spmenu_run. Note that spmenu_run will no longer pass arguments to spmenu., in order to pass arguments to spmenu you use the '-a' argument. speedwm-spde has been updated to reflect this.

- ]]> - - - - spmenu 1.0 release (+ spmenu wiki) - https://spmenu.speedie.site - post4 - Thu, 27 Apr 2023 00:00:00 +0100 - - spmenu 1.0 release! It doesn't add too much stuff worth noting, but adds a lot of bug fixes and small quality of life changes, such as:

-
    -
  • Customizable alpha (without recompiling)
    • -
  • Mouse and Keybind configuration in the config file
    • -
  • Usage of arrays in spmenu_desktop leading to much, much better performance
    • -
  • Fixed macOS support
    • -
  • Added Caps Lock indicator
    • -
  • Inner padding (margin)
    • -
  • Many changed arguments and config file/.Xresources entries
    • -
  • Better documentation
    • -
  • Many, many bug fixes
    • -
-

There's also a new spmenu specific wiki, where information regarding spmenu will be posted.

-

Unfortunately, this update likely means your configuration files and themes will have to be rewritten to support it. However all the default themes have been rewritten, so you can just replace your installed themes with those. This is for maintainence reasons though, so I thought doing it before 1.0 was a good idea.

-

1.0 is released now, install it now!

- ]]> - - spmenu 1.1 release https://spmenu.speedie.site