Re: General questions from a naive mind...

[Paul Jones <pjones@metalab.unc.edu>]

First, you should have your computer checked as you or your email program
attached the Happy99.exe worm!

for more on that see:
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/happy99.worm.html

You may use the Fixhappy.exe tool to rid yourself of the worm.
http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/fix.happy99.worm.html

People in the class using Windows machines should now check for the worm
as it sends itself on with each e-mail.

On Thu, 20 Jan 2000, Harry Ahlas wrote:

> 1.  What is a "kernel"?
> 
> I'm pretty new to the whole software world, and hopefully one of you can
> supply me with a concise definition.
the small core of an operating system. the software to communicates with
the chip itself.

the Linux Kernel HOW-TO says:

---
2.1 What does the kernel do, anyway? 

The Unix kernel acts as a mediator for your programs and your hardware.
First, it does (or arranges for) the memory management for all of the
running programs (processes), and makes sure that they all get a fair (or
unfair, if you please) share of the processor's cycles. In addition, it
provides a nice, fairly portable interface for programs to talk to your
hardware.
There is certainly more to the kernel's operation than this, but these
basic functions are the most important to know.
---

> 2.  If I came up with a very useful new kind of software, how much more
> money would I make if I kept it "proprietary" instead of "free"?
> 
> I'm assuming that it's a significant amount, but I'm not sure and would
> like to know before we discuss the articles.  It's like this: if I'm
> gonna make millions by keeping my software proprietary and only
> thousands if I keep it open source, I'd be pretty likely to throw
> morality right out the window and take the money, even if it will hurt
> future software advancement.  I just want to know how much of a factor
> money is in people's decisions to make their software proprietary.

it depends on how many people buy your software product as the marginal
cost of the item drops with each sell unlike say selling apples. that is
your costs for producing 1 copy or 1 million copies are close to the same
while your profit increases with each sell. so if you can get your product
very very widely used you could become as rich as, well, bill gates.

so the incentive for selling your software is very high -- until you see
that it's not all that easy to get millions of users and that that user
base can be fickle -- wordperfect was once the ruling wordprocessing
software, lotus 1-2-3 the leading spreadsheet software. 

also you'd need to support your users. they could pay you or maybe they
wouldn't.

open source means giving it away. it makes no sense, but look who's become
newly wealthy. not that many folks competing with microsoft in any area by
selling their proprietary products.

keeping reading open sources and be sure to ask your question to donnie
barnes on tuesday.

==========================================================================
                             Paul Jones
   "We must protect our precious bodily fluids!" General Jack D Ripper
http://MetaLab.unc.edu/pjones/ at the Site Formerly Known As SunSITE.unc.edu
  pjones@MetaLab.unc.edu   voice: (919) 962-7600     fax: (919) 962-8071 
===========================================================================