shameful censoring of mono opposition

[Scott James Remnant]

On Sun, 2009-06-07 at 18:36 -0400, Mark Fink wrote:

> I hope you get rid of MONO. only then can your reputations be restored.
> 
From my point of view, I don't see any reason why we should restrict
software developers from programming in a language or environment in
which they feel comfortable.

Ubuntu has development environments for C, C++, ObjectiveC, D, Pascal,
Fortran, Haskell, Perl, Python, R, Ruby, BASIC, Java, OCaml, Ada, COBOL,
and probably a dozen really important languages that didn't fall off the
top of my head.

Why should Ubuntu actively prevent a developer from writing software in
C# if they wish?  That software may not even be intended to be shipped
in Ubuntu, what if they want to use Ubuntu as the basis for an
application that happens to be written in C#?  Do you seriously believe
we shouldn't allow this?

For that reason, I actively and passionately disagree with any argument
that a C# Development environment such as Mono should not be provided
for Ubuntu.


Since I believe that software developers should be allowed to program in
whatever language they like, I'm obviously not going to be hypocritical
and suggest that free software developers should not be allowed to.

If a free software developer chooses C# to write their application. I
don't see that we should treat it any differently as if they had written
it in C, or Python, or Haskell.

We should select the applications in our default install based on merit,
on features, on ease-of-use and other more important matters.  So for
that reason, you'll find a couple of Mono-based applications in Ubuntu
simply because they are the best of their breed right now.


On a personal note, I really quite like C#.  This is unsurprising, I
grew up with Borland's development tools; I cut my teeth on Turbo C++
and Turbo Pascal, and my first real foray into GUI development was with
Borland Delphi.

It'd be surprising if I didn't like Anders' latest creation.


On the patent concerns, the only thing I'd say is that patents are
inherently uninteresting unless they are being enforced by their
holders.  Since Microsoft are not currently enforcing any C#-related
patents--indeed is it even known whether they hold any?--that doesn't
appear to be a concern.

If you are worried about software in Ubuntu that is alleged elsewhere[0]
by Microsoft to infringe patents it does hold, and is apparently
actively enforcing, I suggest starting a separate thread to discuss
removing the kernel from the archive.

Scott

[0] ie. to another Linux distributor, not to us
-- 
Scott James Remnant
scott at ubuntu.com
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: signature.asc
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 197 bytes
Desc: This is a digitally signed message part
URL: <https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ubuntu-devel-discuss/attachments/20090608/25f9be72/attachment.sig>