Terminology: FOSS vs. `Legacy Software'?
Bruce Dawson
jbd at codemeta.com
Sat Aug 6 20:49:14 EDT 2011
In contrast - I like the term "legacy software" for the likes of
proprietary software.
We're talking about changing mindsets here - not the mindsets of those
who read mailing lists like this one, but the PHBs who justify the
purchase of proprietary software.
This is a good way of letting them know that Windows and the like is
"old hat".
And the more people (especially their peers) who says this, the more
they'll believe it!
--Bruce
On 08/06/2011 08:34 PM, Lori Nagel wrote:
> I actually kind of liked the term legacy software, well, at least at
> first. Then I thought about it a bit more and realized that legacy
> software could easily be confusingly applied to things like the old
> Athena Widget set, and X11 user interface being used currently in the
> Wograld project. (I could never get the basics of SDL to work or
> figure it out, plus SDL is upgrading to a new broke version from what
> I read on the SDL list.)
> But if Legacy software was used like this, then I guess my old Athena
> Widget set and X11 user interface for Wograld is "New, trendy and up
> to date" okay, I'm a hardcore dork and proud of it.
>
> Conversely, there is unfortunately new proprietary software being
> written everyday, including new versions of things like Skype and
> Flash. I think it's going to take a while to convince all the
> programmers not to write proprietary software anymore, part of it is
> being paid to write proprietary software, and the other half is
> companies making the decisions that the business model relies
> on closing the source up.
>
> I think what has to change is some of the business models and the ways
> people think about making money. I think people are already being
> forced to change some business models whether they like it or not. If
> proprietary software isn't a viable business model anymore, people
> will probably stop making it (with the exception of some crazy
> paranoid hobbyist who doesn't want anyone to see his code, but then
> who would care about using it anyway if everyone considers proprietary
> software a bad thing.)
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> *From:* Joshua Judson Rosen <rozzin at geekspace.com>
> *To:* Greater New Hampshire <gnhlug-discuss at gnhlug.org>
> *Sent:* Friday, August 5, 2011 7:42 PM
> *Subject:* Terminology: FOSS vs. `Legacy Software'?
>
> I originally wrote this as a private e-mail, but I figured I'd send it
> along to greater GNHLUG--because I realised that I would actually like
> to engage you all...:
>
> --------------------
>
> maddog has written a blog-post proposing that the terms "closed-source"
> and "proprietary" be replaced by the term "legacy software":
>
>
> http://www.linuxpromagazine.com/Online/Blogs/Paw-Prints-Writings-of-the-maddog/Do-not-say-Closed-Source-or-Proprietary-Software-instead-say-Legacy-Software
>
> I've been thinking a lot about this, myself--following mainly from
> a couple of recent conversations with friends and family:
> one that came out of the `cobbled whole-home audio' thing, and another
> that took place upon someone seeing my NanoNote (sayng, `More Linux?
> Really, what can Linux do that Windows or Mac OS X can't?');
> and, actually, now I remember that there was another relevant one--
> with the owner of the local pharmacy down on Main St., about
> their digital signature-pads; and another with my wife (the nurse)
> about software-based medical devices and the modern `medical science'
> (or lack thereof) behind them....
>
> I agree with the idea that maddog's expressed, but I'm not so sure
> about the specific choice of terminology.
>
> I should, perhaps, apologise for the length of this, up front
> (there's a pile of other suggested terms toward the end--actually,
> more toward the middle--with context between here and there...).
>
> I've been thinking about what terms would best help to articulate to
> `the typical uncaring luddite', which required me examine the terms
> in which *I* actually think about the issues; and I think it's,
> basically, mainly along two lines....
>
> One way that I think about these issues is, as a maker, something like:
>
> I have a project to do, and my choices of collaborators are
> either a cooperative community, or a hostile corporation
> that's going to fight me at every step (and charge me a premium
> for it!). Which would you pick? I don't really care for
> the `Nerd Fight-Club' thing....
>
> I guess that's in the same vein as `my favourite paintings are bought
> as blank canvases, et idem for books'.... And maybe it's telling that
> I really wanted to remember my friend's question as "What can YOU do
> WITH Linux that YOU can't do WITH Windows or Mac OS X?", when I'm
> pretty sure that's not how he asked it.
>
> The second line of thought, which probably makes for more generally-
> applicable conversation, could be classed as the decison between
> `permanent vs. disposable' systems. Like, with the home-audio thing....
> A friend and colleague remarked that it was `hilarious that I had
> cobbled together an audio system far nicer than what some major
> players in the home-audio market have been able to do'. My response
> to him was (bear with me...):
>
> The *really* funny part is that I *was* ready to just put a switch/amp
> into the basement and run speaker-wire all over the house..., but then
> I went looking into ways of doing remote control fo the
> switch/amplifier,
> and didn't find any open/standard mechanism for that other than
> goofy IR stuff (like `relay infrared signals through a wire to a
> serial port and write custom code to deal with the lack of standards
> in IR signalling').
>
> Then I remembered that I knew of a company that made this sort of
> stuff--
> because I'd actually worked there a few years back. Of course,
> when I was there, they were using a junky, home-grown protocol
> (with a single-layer `stack') which was basically unworkable
> for anyone outside the company (it was close enough to unworkable
> for people *inside* the company...). So, I thought: I wonder
> if they're off of their weird-proprietary-junk protocol yet...,
> or if anyone else has actually filled the `use open standards' hole'.
>
> So I looked at their current lineup, and found that it was using
> something called `Gridcast'--which made me wonder:
>
> `Gridcast'? WTF is that? Yet another weird, proprietary thing...?
>
> I was also reminded that their prices were multiple orders
> of magnitude more than I wanted to spend (especially for something
> that's not clearly extensible--throw-away stuff is supposed to be
> *cheap*...).
>
> Since it wasn't obvious that there was any open standard for
> doing remote control of audio switches, and the "AV" in the
> "HomePlug AV" term that I'd seen associated with `Gridcast'
> didn't actually seem to have anything to do with Audio or Video
> aside from being `a fast-enough link for audio and video'...,
> the thought occurred to me: maybe circuit-switching really is
> finally dead?
>
> So, then I went looking at all-digital audio distribution, went
> looking
> for ready-made products (like `Gridcast', I guess...), and ended up
> figuring that it was probably going to be quicker to just hack it up
> myself (possibly with some gently-repurposed standards) than to even
> figure out what any of the consumer products I saw were even actually
> doing..., and then it worked.
>
> Maybe there's something wrong when you find yourself saying
> things like, `I'll do it myself because I don't have time
> for the ready-made solutions'.
>
> Maybe I should be an entrepreneur....
>
>
> It's illustrative of my more general thought-process, which often
> starts with:
>
> "I'm not even sure what my needs are right now, let alone what
> they'll be in the future...."
>
> ... and resolves as:
>
> "I'm not going to pay a premium to lock myself into something that
> might not meet my needs, and certainly not something that it may
> not even be possible to *make* meet my needs."
>
> Is that how it resolves for everyone? Or do most people think
> something more like, `I don't know what my needs are--but surely
> the provider of my solution does!'?
>
> I know I'm too young to be saying this (and I'm probably in entirely
> the wrong eneration)..., but I hate throw-away junk. I remember
> someone on Slashdot actually had a good quip--oh, here it is
> <http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1691504&cid=32625306
> <http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1691504&cid=32625306>>:
>
> > People are not engineers: they buy air conditioners,
> > refrigerators and cars. Very few people can design, build and
> > service them.
>
> It's not about being an "engineer". It's about taking
> responsibility for yourself and not buying into American
> anti-intellectualism where it's actually trendy to be helpless and
> stupid.
>
> It's so trendy to be helpless and stupid that you're discouraged
> from knowing enough to even recognize a well made device.
>
> Though, it's not that throw-away items are all bad *per se*--
> it's just..., like I wrote above: if the throw-away actually
> costs more than the option that lasts and grows with your needs,
> then the economy's all backward and it's a bum deal.
>
> So, trying to come up with a vocabulary to express that pithily,
> here's some free-association type stuff from my notebook
> (in two generally-opposing columns):
>
> free proprietary
> high-margin
> open-source closed-source
> open-ended closed(-?)
> limited
> restricted
> permanent disposable
> durable (as in `durable goods'?) throw-away
> reusable single-use
> extensible limited-use
> growable (as in `grows w/ your needs') limited-(?)
> expandable
> organic manufactured
>
> repairable (as in `user-'? irreparable
> serviceable (as in `user-'?) ?-serviced
>
> ¿commodity? (either col: unsure connotation)
>
> renewable constrained
> free-market captive-market
> free-range cage-raised (cathedral)
> peer-reviewed unreviewed
>
>
> "Commodity" is in the middle, surrounded by uncertainty, because
> "commodity" can have either a very good connotation (a good investment
> due to matching standards and being easily replaced/extended, and
> being cost-effective) or a very bad one (cheap crap) depending on
> context--and "commodity" can be aptly applied to either FOSS
> (for all of the good reasons) or proprietary systems (with all of
> the negative connotations), but I'm not sure how stable that is.
>
> And I'm not sure if it's noticeable, but there's a certain theme
> in some parts of the collection above, that leads to "legacy"
> not being present as a `standard term of deprecation': one of
> the problems with proprietary software (and I've heard this complaint
> from at least one developer of proprietary software) is that
> the throw-away nature of binary-only software means that it basically
> `doesn't work as a legacy'.
>
> I seem to recall, several years ago, hearing someone say something like:
>
> "Gosh, I've been maintaining my resume in troff for 20 years--
> what's the likelihood that a given piece of [what we're now
> considering calling `legacy'] software will survive 20 years,
> let alone long enough to really be `someone's legacy'?"
>
> (kudos if the person who said it remembers that it was him :))
>
>
> I guess I have two issues with the word, "legacy", in this context:
> one issue is that a person must be somewhat technical to understand
> it when it's used in the `legacy system' sense--or to even parse it
> as an adjective; consulting my `dict' command, the only adjectival
> form of "legacy" I find is in FOLDOC (via the Jargon File):
>
> legacy system
> legacy
> legacy code
> legacy software
>
> <jargon> A computer system or {application program} which
> continues to be used because of the cost of replacing or
> redesigning it and often despite its poor competitiveness and
> compatibility with modern equivalents. The implication is
> that the system is large, monolithic and difficult to modify.
>
> If legacy software only runs on antiquated {hardware} the cost
> of maintaining this may eventually outweigh the cost of
> replacing both the software and hardware unless some form of
> {emulation} or {backward compatibility} allows the software to
> run on new hardware.
>
> (1998-08-09)
>
>
> And, yes--that's perfecly (*perfectly*!) in line with maddog's
> suggestion :)
>
> But (and here's my second issue): if it's parsed as a *noun*
> (as by a less-technical person) then "legacy" stands a fair chance
> of being interpreted as meaning something *good*.... :(
>
> Take, for example, this quip by Markus Fix (which I found
> on lispmeister.com, back when it still existed--it's since
> been living in my private `fortune' file):
>
> "I bought the Meisterstueck No 149 at age 20, and it served me well
> during all my travels throughout Europe, Asia, Africa, America
> and the Pacific Islands. It's a remarkable and beautiful piece
> of engineering. During the same timespan I worked through
> more than 30 keyboards. People keep asking me: "Why do you keep
> a journal in longhand using a fountain pen, isn't that a bit
> archaic?"
>
> "People have been asking me the same kind of questions about
> Lisp. The answer is:
>
> "You can't leave a legacy using ephemeral technology."
>
>
> It seems like `legacy software is no way to leave a legacy' has
> enough hackish irony in it to be dangerous....
>
>
> --
> "Don't be afraid to ask (?f.((?x.xx) (?r.f(rr))))."
>
>
>
>
>
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