Robert Pogson

I have often seen it in my career in teaching. A monthly contract is set and you go to work. At first, you are on fire making plans and setting things up, matching resources against objectives. It is easy to be motivated. Then reality (students) enters its ugly head and plans must be revised to fit reality, good or bad. It becomes the teacher’s task to motivate students who could care less about education and to guide the inspired learners in good directions. Then in the short days of winter, it is easy to be depressed about how things are going and to dwell on the failures rather than the successes. That’s when the good principal steps in and gives an encouraging example or remark. Teachers get fired up all over again responding to the current problems with creative means, doing more with less, getting a teacher’s greatest assets (students) fired up to solve the problems and being pleasantly surprised that impossible tasks become easy when approached differently.

It’s all about inspiration. An inspired person can do difficult things that others consider impossible. Like a fire, you cannot will the fire to grow you have to give it what it needs. It will grow naturally. Yelling at a fire does nothing. Punishing it by removing resources does the opposite of what is required. Rewarding it by dumping an excess of resources just smothers it. The same is true about inspiring people to do great things according to research published recently.

“If you want to help people perform well, make sure that they don’t have to worry about other stuff besides their work and give them positive verbal feedback about the work they do.”
see Motivation and Reward | Zwillingssterns Weltenwald

That’s a good rule to remember to encourage FLOSS developers and contributors to do great work. It’s also why detractors invest so much effort to make FLOSSies feel badly about their work. That reduces inspiration and disrupts productivity. It’s why trolls come to my site to disagree with everyone sharing news of good results in the world of FLOSS. It’s why I ban them eventually…

Look at the heroes of FLOSS. Some of them appear to work incredibly hard for many years with increasing motivation to do well without being paid on “piece work” or per unit of production. Compare that with the minions of non-free software who work for years and produce stuff like Vista or “8″, totally uninspired crapware, which users love to hate. Stuff that actually reduces the motivation of users and reviewers. It’s like those unfortunate souls whose only joy is to share their pain.

FLOSS is the right way to do IT. That’s why I recommend and use daily Debian GNU/Linux, a cooperative product of inspired individuals and organizations scratching their itches to succeed at producing great software. I used to use that other OS but it depressed me greatly by running slowly and crashing just at the instants we needed it to allow me and my students to succeed. In the whole world, over decades, that other OS has been depressing people by arbitrary rules in the EULA forced on people who find nothing else on retail shelves. Rather than abusing users like that FLOSS inspires them to do great things. That’s the right way to do IT, inspired, productive, creative, encouraged…

"We feel that customers will get a great experience having a Linux distribution that is maintained by the Debian community. Debian and derivatives thereof (such as Mint and Ubuntu) are among the most popular on the Internet, and Google itself is a heavy contributor to the Debian code base. We will also continue to offer CentOS, and are actively exploring other operating system options based on feedback from our customers," a Google spokesperson told us when we asked about the reason for the change.”
see Google's cloud dumps custom Linux, switches to Debian

It makes me laugh to remember all the times trolls have come here to berate me for being an amateur and using Debian GNU/Linux. Well, the shoe’s on the other foot. Google has just endorsed Debian GNU/Linux as their new default GNU/Linux OS for their cloud. Not only that but Google is contributing to Debian and valuing the brand of “Official Debian GNU/Linux”. I guess Google’s customers value that brand as well. Google does give customers what they want unlike other providers who seek to enslave customers.

A few days ago I talked with a young woman whose ISP had notified her of disconnection if she did not take care of her malware spamming the network. Over the phone we discovered that she had managed to install an anti-virus application but had not even her firewall running… She did not need this stress during the last couple of weeks of her school year. We activated her firewall then but today her last use of that other OS was to compute her weighted grade average and to back up her files. She’s at 89% with one more course to be reported. This is one sharp cookie but still a babe in the woods when it comes to IT. She is going to love LibreOffice instead of that thing with the ribbon.

Today I met with her to install GNU/Linux. Unfortunately, younger associates had recommended Ubuntu GNU/Linux instead of Debian GNU/Linux. She backed up her files and installed the OS herself from a bootable installation CD. The only questions she needed answered were about the keyboard “language” etc. There were no issues with drivers. She’s running now. Her friend will install GNOME in place of Unity which is an improvement. I forgot to ask what release of Ubuntu GNU/Linux it was but I think even now one can replace Unity with something more familiar.

So, another installation of that other OS bites the dust. There are still a few to go, far too many for me to take care of, but between Android/Linux galloping across the mobile space and GNU/Linux chewing at M$’s roots, the world is becoming a better place one PC at a time. This young lady has friends, lots of them, and she still has one year of formal education scheduled during which her friends can see her “different” computing experience. I expect she will be happy to report snappy reliable performance… She’s an expert writer. Perhaps she will post an article here.

I love to hear Richard Stallman speak. He has a talent for digging down to the fundamentals before presenting his thesis. You have to be pretty thick not to understand the man:

RMS: Non-free software is not the world’s only problem. I undertook to work on this problem because (1) it dropped in my lap (I could not be neutral except by leaving my field), (2) I had an idea for how I could tackle it effectively, and (3) nobody else was even working on it.
…
I am not the best person to ask for this kind of help, because I focus on something else. Rather than trying to convince IT managers that it is more profitable to respect our freedom–I don’t know whether that is true–I try to convince computer users that they should insist on software that respects their freedom.”

That’s not actually a talk he gave but an e-mail Q&A back in 2000 but it’s just like his talks, clear and based solidly on principles that he lays out.

see Thus Spake Stallman – Slashdot

So, when commentators here assign all kinds of evil to RMS, I know they just aren’t listening or cannot read. RMS is not about harming anyone but making IT that works for people. It’s so easy to do that if you follow his advice and use Free Software, code that is accompanied by permission to run, examine, modify and distribute under the same terms. Those principles help ensure that by using the software you are not being lead around by the nose and enslaved by others. Compare that with M$’s EULA which definitely lists all the rights you give up by using their software. M$ was the reason I got involved with FLOSS so many years ago. I had not heard of RMS and FSF and GPL. That came later and I’m glad it did.

I recommend Debian GNU/Linux operating system which is not on RMS’s preferred list because Debian accepts that non-Free software may be OK and distributes some. I use Debian GNU/Linux in the real world where hardware may exist for which there is no Free Software, like Intel NICs. Rather than advising people not to use that hardware already owned and in the house, I recommend using a little non-Free stuff but being aware of compatible hardware for future purchases. Wasting hardware is unethical just as abusing users.

It’s too much for ordinary consumers, the vast majority of users of IT, to deal with a pile of such issues when moving to Free Software. Over time more manufacturers are supplying drivers for Linux so this issue may well disappear, but in the meantime some compromise must be made in practice. There’s nothing wrong with the principles however. It’s the right way to do IT with shared, re-used, redistributable software because it’s the best quality at the lowest price and it respects the freedom of the users.

Robbers aren’t loved if they offer to steal less from victims…
“SMBs still stuck on XP and Office 2003 can get a 15 percent discount for Windows 8 Pro and Office 2013 purchases, reports Computerworld.
Since Microsoft’s Open License website lists Windows 8 Pro and Office 2013 for a total of $561, the 15 percent discount translates to about $84. It might not sound like much, but it helps, especially if SMBs are in the market for multiple licences.”
see Microsoft offers limited discount for XP users – Up to 15 percent

SMBs, you can get Debian GNU/Linux and LibreOffice for $0 per unit, you can make unlimited copies, you can make unlimited upgrades, and you don’t need to upgrade your hardware unless you want to do that. You also get Freedom instead of slavery when you make those choices.

Reminder: XP’s EULA states, “Installation and Use. Except as otherwise expressly provided in this EULA, you may install, use, access, display and run only one (1) copy of the SOFTWARE on the COMPUTER. The SOFTWARE may not be used by more than two (2) processors at any one time on the COMPUTER, unless a higher number is indicated on the Certificate of Authenticity. You may permit a maximum of ten (10) (“Connection Maximum”) computers or other electronic devices (each a “Device”) to connect to the COMPUTER to utilize one or more of the following services of the SOFTWARE: File services, Print services, Internet Information services, and remote access (including connection sharing and telephony services). The ten (10) Connection Maximum includes any indirect connections made through “multiplexing” or other software or hardware which pools or aggregates connections. Except as otherwise permitted herein, you may not use the Device to use, access, display or run the SOFTWARE, the SOFTWARE’s User Interface or other executable software residing on the COMPUTER. This ten connection maximum does not apply to any other uses of the Product.”

HEHEHE. You can also cut down on the number of lawyers you need to hire with the FLOSS licences of GNU/Linux.