A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

[Raven-sb]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

How very generous of you, Raven, but it doesn't say anything about your cognitive or reasoning skills if you let your attitudes about MONO on the Linux desktop be determined the by writings of someone like me who apposes it, instead investigating for yourself the facts and principles involved, and making up your own mind. That's like saying you are going switch to allegiance to China because you don't like what Americans say about the Chinese dictatorship. After all, they have clauses in their constitution which guarantee freedom of speech, of assembly and of worship, and they are always talking about "getting along", and avoiding "pro democracy" extremists because they claim they are a democracy, so what is there to loose by switching?

But, we're just playing word games here, aren't we Raven. I'm not really "the excuse". You've always been pro-MONO, haven't you? Guess what? I don't care. You support it, I appose it. So what? As long as it's a threat to the distro I use I will continue to appose it.

BTW, You DID read the UTB minutes of June 29th, 2009, which said that future remixes of the Ubuntu desktop will be dependent on MONO, didn't you? You DO UNDERSTAND what DEPENDENT means, don't you? No need to "force" MONO onto Ubuntu, the UTB has already capitulated, and Microsoft's API will soon control the Ubuntu desktop. As long as MONO doesn't creep into Kubuntu, or I can install the MONO libs and runtime without making Kubuntu unusable, I'll stay with it. BUT, IF Debian becomes dependent on MONO, and there is a push for that to become a reality as we write, then every upstream distro based on Debian will be FORCED to accept MONO or change to another base.

Note: This post will be my last on this topic, and as such I've been modifying it to reflect my thoughts as the evening has progressed.

I read through the UTB minutes of June 29th, 2009 here https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...ne/028347.html and I can't find anywhere they say that future remixes of the Ubuntu desktop will be dependent upon MONO, as you claim. It's saddening that you felt that you had to make personal attacks on me. But if that's the way you want it, fine. I will clarify one point and then I wont post any more on this subject.

As I said, before I read one of your threads, I was tending towards being anti-mono. After reading the claims you were making, I decided that they were serious enough to research them myself, if for no other reason then to provide balance. I had posted a number of links supporting the anti-mono stance, now for fairness I wanted to see if the pro-mono people were as bad as you said they were. I also wanted to see if the claims you were making were valid. My own research on this matter led me to the conclusion that you were not making factual claims. So I asked you to support your claims. Interesting enough you choose Boycott Novell to provide most of your supporting evidence.

The only problem there is that during my own research, I found that Boycott Novell under it's current ownership is less than credible. I'm not going to get into a debate about BN. You support what Roy has to say, I found evidence that shows that on at least one occasion he was talking through his hat. At this stage, I began to post back my findings, and you decided to take me to task. The interesting thing is that the more you did this, the more I researched your claims, and more I became convinced that Mono isn't the threat you make it out to be. So now, yes, due to my own research, which started as a direct result of a thread you posted, I am pro-mono.

I get the fact you are anti mono, and I'm fine with it. All I was asking is, one: you make factual claims and back them up, two: That if you use quotes, that you actually quote what someone said instead of what you claim they say (or your interpretation of what they said), and three that you refrain from making unfounded and inflammatory accusations.

Sadly you broke the Ubuntu code of conduct by taking it upon yourself to attack me. Believe or not GreyGeek, I carry no ill will towards you. I don't having my mental capacity being brought into question or any of the other attacks you deemed necessary to make on me. If you aren't prepared to have a discussion without making personal attacks I'm not going to discuss things with you any further.

I wish you all the best,

Raven

[GreyGeek]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

wrong date

Find the UTB minutes for 6/29/2009

You will know you have the right minutes when, besides decreeing that future Ubuntu desktop remixes will be dependent on MONO, there follows a section which creates a special applications board.

BTW, the meeting was scheduled for the 3oth, while the text file I read had a timestamp dated the 29th. Could be a timezone difference problem. Anyway, the "next" day requests for clarification resulted in a policy statement was released, though not a clear as the statement in the UTB minutes, which states:

Mono Position Statement
Scott James Remnant scott at ubuntu.com
Tue Jun 30 15:58:44 BST 2009

The Ubuntu Technical Board has been asked for a position statement on the use of C#, specifically the Mono implementation, by applications in Ubuntu.

These applications, as well as the Mono stack, were proposed for inclusion like any other application and underwent the same review process that all new applications and platforms undergo before being accepted into the archive.

With specific regard to the default installed application set, applications have been reviewed and compared against each other on merit and features. These often take place during the Ubuntu Developer Summits, most recently over the default media player.


A common concern cited about Mono is the patent position, largely it seems due to the originator of the C# language and associated ECMA standards.

The Ubuntu Project takes patent issues seriously, and the Ubuntu Technical Board is the governance body that handles allegations of patent infringement. The Ubuntu Technical Board strives to engage with rights holder openly in terms of the code that we ship. If a rights holder claims a patent infringement applies to said code, the Technical
Board will commit to a review of the claim.

The Ubuntu Technical Board has received no claims of infringement against the Mono stack, and is not aware of any such claims having been received by other similar projects.

It is common practice in the software industry to register patents as protection against litigation, rather than as an intent to litigate. Thus mere existence of a patent, without a claim of infringement, is not sufficient reason to warrant exclusion from the Ubuntu Project.

(While the Ubuntu project wishes to be responsive to patent infringement claims, we cannot commit to the assessment and review of claims made by anyone other than the registered rights holder.)

Given the above, the Ubuntu Technical Board sees no reason to exclude Mono or applications based upon it from the archive, or from the default installation set.

Since the Mono stack is already a dependency of the default installation set for many remixes of Ubuntu, including the Desktop Edition, there is no reason to consider a dependency on Mono as an issue when suggesting applications for the default set.

(Other remixes may obviously consider the CD Size implications if an application would introduce the Mono platform to the set.)


Scott
on behalf of the Ubuntu Technical Board
--
Scott James Remnant

which only deals with submitted applications with MONO dependencies, not Ubuntu itself.


EDIT: Well, since you haven't responded and you say you aren't going to post any more to this thread, let me solve your mystery for you.


Here is where your URL came from. When I returned to it a while ago to capture the appropriate URL I noticed something funny. Do you see something funny about what is below your URL, on the line which mentions the TB meeting of 6/30/09?

*

TB meeting, 2009-06-16: https://lists.ubuntu.com/archives/ub...ne/028347.html
o Outstanding actions
+ mdz to talk to kiko/bjornt to investigate drivers powers: continues
+ Mono discussion
o Edubuntu Releases for Karmic and Karmic+1 and hosting on Canonical infrastructure: approval for moving to USB or DVD images if the CD image team is in agreement and consideration is given to effective testing; releases.ubuntu.com vs. cdimage.ubuntu.com is based on download popularity and infrastructure concerns and is not an indication of status, and mirroring questions should be brought up with mirror admins on ubuntu-mirrors@
o Inclusion of universe within Edubuntu: approved
o Ubuntu Core Developer application for Stéphane Graber: approved; congratulations and welcome!
o Ubuntu Core Developer application for James Westby; approved; congratulations and welcome!
* TB meeting, 2009-06-30
o

Scott Kitterman's https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ClamavUpdates proposal for a ClamAV update policy was endorsed by the Technical Board, contingent on the approval of the security and release teams
o Charlie Smotherman was granted upload privileges for ampache, ampache-themes and coherence
o Thierry Carrez was welcomed as a new core developer
o Scott James Remnant has put forward a Technical Board position statement regarding Mono, which is to be published shortly
o The Technical Board is discussing the creation of a new governing body, the Developer Applications Board, to process new developer applications, separating this function from the Technical Board itself

That's right. You'll notice that the URL to the minutes of the 6/30/09 meeting have been removed. BUT, they give a partial description of what they discussed and include my recollections of the creation of the "Developer Applications Board", to process "new developer applications". So, the statement saying the "future Ubuntu desktop remixes will be dependent on MONO" (not just some applications) is no longer available on the official site of the UTB minutes. Unfortunately, the Wayback machine doesn't contain an archive of the minutes. I may have made a copy of it when I first read it. I'll check back in my archival CDs, but meanwhile, a copy "should" be somewhere else on the net.

EDIT:EDIT -- so far, searches on the web only turn up copies of the agenda or prolog to the minutes. I guess from now on I'll have to make copies of FOSS organization statements too. Why did they remove the link to the minutes of THAT meeting? Sad.

[Guest]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

Can I publish this on Pwnage.ca verbatim? I'll link here and give you full credit.

A long time Windows column editor emphasizes an old claim that MONO is platform neutral. In it he cites a favorite de Icaza claim:

Programmers are people with strong opinions. Some people would like more Python or Java; more power to you. Use what you want! But people like [the anti-Mono advocacy group] Boycott Novell do not write a single line of code, so I think there's advocacy coming from people who do not contribute in any real way. They don't even come to the conferences; they're not part of the community in a substantive fashion.

"I'm open to fixing any issues that Mono has. I don't say that Mono is bug-free. They seem to have a more philosophical issue; that Mono is a Microsoft-derived technology, and anything from Microsoft is the devil. I don't think it's a very intellectually honest debate if you start off on that position. And the problem I have is that once you take an extreme position, there's no room for working to a solution."

First, claiming that MONO is "platform neutral" is total nonsense. MONO is more than "joined at the hip" with .NET. It IS .NET. It even includes parts of .NET that are not under the ECMA 334 &335 (WinForms, ADO,. ADP, etc..) and subject, at Microsoft's convenience, to IP lawsuits. MONO is at 2.4.2. Microsoft is about to release .NET 4. So MONO isn't even current with .NET and applications built with MONO could not technically compete with similar .NET applications because .NET programmers can use capabilities added to .NET that won't be in MONO for years, if ever. The whole purpose of the "Glimps of the future...?" thread was to point out that Microsoft added patented COM changes to SilverLight 4 specifically to block MONO on Apple's applet store, after having allowed Apple users to become dependent on MONO/MoonLight based iPhone applets.

.NET is Microsoft's API. MONO is a .NET clone. It is, therefor, Microsoft's API. And, as creator and first manager of the Technical Evangelist group at Microsoft said, "Any code written to Microsoft's API is a WIN for Microsoft...".


de Icaza's second claim, people who appose MONO don't write code, is ludicrous. For that to be true, EVERY FOSS coder would have to be a MONO coder as well, and that is certainly false. MONO is apposed by many, some could say even MORE, FOSS coders who contribute to the Kernel and various GTK and Qt FOSS projects. Even the owner of BN writes software, albeit for his doctoral thesis on medical imaging software. That claim also assumes that ONLY MONO coders have a right to discuss MONO being on Linux. Those who contribute their time (testing, bug reporting, documentation writing) or their money to FOSS aren't entitled to have a say in MONO being on the platform unless, of course, they agree with de Icaza's goal of making the Linux destop dependent on Microsoft's API. The is a position of extreme hubris.

It is not surprising that coders who do not agree with making the Linux desktop dependent on MONO wouldn't go to MONO conferences, or attend MONO adjunct meetings being held at FOSS conferences. Why should they? Then to claim they are "not part of the community" begs the question: which community? The Linux community or the MONO community? The two communities may have some SMALL overlap, but that does not make them equivalent.

Finally, de Icaza claims that those who appose MONO have taken an "extreme position", and so "there's no room for working to a solution". Consider the extreme position claim. Prior to Novell purchasing de Icaza's coding business, and then Novell forming an alliance with Microsoft, MONO was nothing more than de Icaza's experiment with Microsoft's technology, if it was just an experiment. Prior to November 2, 2006 there existed NO major political move to force MONO into Linux and to hijack the GNOME desktop. ALL of the major pro-MONO activity has taken place since Novell & Microsoft began working together to divide and conqueror the Linux community. MOST of the pro-MONO advocates masquerading as Penguins are developers (private or commercial) who prefer and still use Windows as their platform, and see MONO as a method to sell their .NET shareware in a market that owns over 12% of the desktop market share, and growing. The most active pro-MONO folks are employees of firms that use ./NET as their development tool, and have purchased seats on the Ubuntu Advisory Board.

To refresh your history of the "deal", refer to it at: http://www.novell.com/linux/microsoft and notice the occurrence of the word "royalty", and the dichotomy between those who are threatened by lawsuits (coders whose GPL code doesn't make it into SLES) and those who are not (coders whose code does enter the commercial version of SUSE). Why the difference? ROYALTIES paid to Microsoft by Novell for each copy of SLES sold. Said royalty payments "bridge the IP gap", according to Ballmer, and in his mind "proves" IP violations by Linux. By his refusal to dispute those claims Hovsepian gives the consent of silence. The video gives good visual indications of what is the intent of the participants.

I ask you to read that because those who use MONO on SUSE Enterprise Linux Server have protection from a Microsoft lawsuit for using components of MONO which are not under the ECMA. Those who use OpenSUSE or any other distro are NOT protected from an MS lawsuit. If work on making Ubuntu dependent on MONO continues I predict that Microsoft will allow it to continue UNTIL such dependency is too deep to casually remove. Then they will sue.

With the current condition of MONO, what "solution" would work to the advantage of FOSS and Linux? None. What solution would avoid the IP threat? None. One can also ask "what is the problem on Linux that MONO is the solution to?" The claim by MONO coders is that MONO is the best development tool available to Linux. That claim is obviously bogus. IF MONO were the best then why do they need GTK# bindings for MONO in order to make graphical interfaces and dialogs with their apps? Why are they always behind .NET on Windows? Obviously because of patent concerns. The gcc, gdb and the GTK2+ API have given Ubuntu an excellent GNOME desktop, Thunderbird, FireFox, VLC, and many other excellent applications. ALL of it is under the GPL and is free of any known, valid or putative IP threat.

In addition to GTK, there is Qt4. The latest KDE4 is a fantastic desktop. It is, IMO, superior to any Windows or Apple desktop I have ever used. It is what VISTA wanted to be and copied much of. QtCreator & Qt4 is even more powerful and better integrated into a single GUI RAD development tool than any other on the planet. I used MS VC++ 6.0 at work for several years. It doesn't hold a candle to Qt/QtCreator. Of course, that is just my opinion, based on my experience and my preference. Those are the exact same reasons why Windows developers choose MONO, instead of Visual C++, VisualFoxPro, or other GUI RAD tools available on Windows. (Which, although they say are "VISUAL" and OOP, aren't necessarily either visual or OOP.)

MONO enthusiasts claim that they can write once and compile and run on any platform and that MONO is RAD (Rapid Application Development). While developing with GTK on Windows is possible using MinGW compiler and imported Linux utilities, the GTK/Windows combination is klutzy at best and not RAD. QT4, on the other hand is both write once, run anyware AND GUI RAD. It is also unencumbered by IP threats or in need of bindings to make up for abilities it does not have. Java is still universal. It is still state of the art.

.NET was created to compete against Java and its jvm (java virtual machine) and jit (just in time compilation). MONO/.NET use a vm and a jit, which, they claim, runs MONO/.NET apps as fast as a natively compiled C or C++ app. I was on SecondLife before they switched to the MONO powered engine. Quite frankly, running MONO, I see NO improvement in SecondLife's speed or in the number of avatars which can occupy a sim before it lags into uselessness. The limit was 70 before MONO is still is after MONO. The most frequent complaint on SL is "lag, lag, lag, lag, lag" surrounded by a flood of profanity. .NET's solution for the London Stock Exchange was FIVE TIMES SLOWER than existing stock market trading applications running under Linux, which the LSE has now purchased to replace their .NET "solution". Java is still around on Linux and Windows and with the many available GUI RAD front ends it is yet another GUI RAD tool in which one can write once and use on any platform. A skilled Java developer has no trouble matching the development speed of a skilled MONO developer. I have an application called DRUID II, which is a java jar file that runs on either Linux or Windows without changes, if one has the Java jvm installed on the platform. It allows me to design, create, manage, edit and document a variety of database back ends, graphically. To run it on any platform I issue

java -jar druidii.jar

It is a classic example of a cross platform application built with Java. I used it to export my Oracle dbs to PostgreSQL, and visa-versa.

Here is my workable solution for using MONO on Linux. Microsoft should do with .NET what TrollTech did with Qt. Put ALL of .NET under the ECMA 334 & 335 standards, and the Community Promise, including future developments, just as TrollTech did with Qt under the GPL, and then I will have NO problem with MONO being on Linux or of a MONO powered desktop. Otherwise, MONO is represents a valid IP patent concern for Linux users.

[GreyGeek]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

Can I publish this on Pwnage.ca verbatim? I'll link here and give you full credit.
.....

I would rather you merely post a brief quote or summary and a link to the OP. Others have contributed to the thread and hold varying opinions about MONO.

[claydoh]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

That's right. You'll notice that the URL to the minutes of the 6/30/09 meeting have been [b]removed[b].

greygeek, did you know you can view page histories of wiki pages, and view the diffs between revisions as well as the actual versions of each saved edit? I don't see anything removed from the Ubuntu weekly newsletter, but every edit and version is viewable, if you would like.

You will see that no url was ever removed from that section - it was never there to begin with. Edit 18 actually added the url for the 2009-06-16 TB meeting. There never was a url for the later one.

[Guest]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

Can I publish this on Pwnage.ca verbatim? I'll link here and give you full credit.
.....

I would rather you merely post a brief quote or summary and a link to the OP. Others have contributed to the thread and hold varying opinions about MONO.

http://www.pwnage.ca/?p=460 - Done

[GreyGeek]

Re: A WORKABLE solution for using MONO on Linux!

...
greygeek, did you know you can view page histories of wiki pages, and view the diffs between revisions as well as the actual versions of each saved edit? ....

You are referring to the "info" link next to the "Immutable page" wording, which is why I find the whole situation worrisome.

The "policy" statement was posted on the 30th. I had never seen or read the policy page until I attempted to relocate for Raven where I remembered the URL to the 6-29 UTB minutes to be. The URL of the link to the UTB minutes which I read were similar in nature and form to the UTB minutes two months before. It shows a more "in the moment" transcription of comments by UTB members. I also now wonder why a link to the real minutes isn't in the wiki when links to some (all?) previous UTB minutes are present, some in forms which one would expect if the secretary were recording the actual give and take that occurs at such meetings.

When I came back to this issue 6 months later I was surprised to see no link to the UTB minutes of 6-29, but just a mere "agenda", posted a week later, of what the meeting was about, and a statement that

Scott James Remnant has put forward a Technical Board position statement regarding Mono, which is to be published shortly

. Obviously the next day. The thrust of the statements about MONO in the minutes I read are so different from the thrust in the "policy" statement it seems to me that someone realized what it might mean if the minutes remained accessible.

The real minutes I read began with a listing of the names of the UTB members that were present at the meeting, and specifically noting that Mark Shuttlesworth was absent! That fact is not shown in the "minutes" summary on the wiki, and raises the question of how could I have known that Shuttlesworth was not at the 6-29 meeting if I hadn't read the entire minutes. I thought shuttlesworth's absence was extraordinary, considering the explosive nature of the statement about MONO that was in the minutes that I read. I wondered what his real position on MONO was, or if he allowed a majority of UTB members to overrule him in determining the future course of Ubuntu. What I also read in the real minutes burned into my mind ... a paragraph explaining why MONO wasn't really an IP threat (essentially identical to the "policy" statement position, but that is about "applications", not the Ubuntu desktop), dismissing IP threats and putative Microsoft legal actions, and ending with the phrase "future Ubuntu desktop remixes will be dependent on MONO". It didn't say "applications", it said "future Ubuntu desktop remixes". Not believing my eyes, I read that over and over to make sure I wasn't misunderstanding what I was reading.

Shuttlesworth's absence at the 6-29 meeting becomes even more puzzling when one considers what he said in an interview, paraphrasing: "If Windows API becomes the default on Linux then what is the point of Linux?"

I am continuing to search the web for a complete copy of the minutes but it would be easier if the UTB just posted the true and original minutes in the wiki themselves. As the Wikipedia aptly demonstrates, publicly edited versions of a wiki can be and often is subject to mischief, and people owning the servers can do what they want. That is another reason why the absence of the complete 6-29 minutes is worrisome to me.


EDIT:
The section that was below was moved to a post that is more relevant, to avoid topic confusion.
http://kubuntuforums.net/forums/inde...opic=3108846.0