Re: Changing "Linux" with "GNU/Linux" or "GNU"

[Joachim Noreiko <jnoreiko yahoo com>]

--- Don Scorgie <DonScorgie Blueyonder co uk> wrote:

> On Thu, 2006-08-03 at 11:51 -0400, Richard Stallman
> wrote:
> > Meanwhile, if the maintainers who deal with
> substantial issues in the
> > code don't want to fix these problems, that
> obstacle is not very hard
> > to work around.
> > 
> > I am sure we can find a volunteer to do it.  We
> could give him write
> > access to the sources, solely for the purpose of
> making these changes
> > in comments and documentation.  It would not be
> necessary for this
> > volunteer to know enough for real work on GNOME
> development.
> > Maintainers watching the commit logs would verify
> that this volunteer
> > doesn't ever change the code.
> 
> I get the feeling that doing this may upset a few
> people.  If someone
> marks the bug as WONTFIX (or would likely mark it as
> WONTFIX), the
> chances are that when they see someone committing
> the same fix directly
> (without the maintainers consent), they'll revert
> the change and then
> complain loudly.

The fact is, though, that the GDP pretty much has
carte blanche when it comes to the documentation of
GNOME-hosted apps. 
(And for apps outside of GNOME, I really have no idea
how much sway our guidelines have, if at all. There's
not much adherence to the HIG, for example.)

But the fact remains that I'd rather not write 'linux'
OR 'GNU/Linux' in user documentation. Come to think of
it, I'd rather not write 'GNOME' either. I'd like to
be able to write 'Ubuntu', because that's what I'm
sitting in front of. It's what's written on the
install discs, and it's on the splash screen and the
desktop, and the forums where I get support. Coming
from a one-stop shop like Windows or Mac, the
linux/GNU/X/GNOME/distro stack feels like quite a lot
to learn -- and the ordinary user shouldn't have to.

I saw an article on digg recently that suggested it
would be better to have only a single linux (sorry,
GNU/Linux) distro. But of course that provoked an
outcry from geeks demanding choice... so we have five
million of the things, and I can't tell the person
reading my documentation the name of his operating
system.

Joachim



	
	
		
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