Apple Announces New "Safari" Browser

In kicking off the Macworld Expo
keynote, Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled
a new Macintosh web browser named
Safari. Jobs
said the browser was
"based on standards", "works with any Web site", has much-improved
performance over IE (page-loading speed is "three times faster",
JavaScript performs twice as fast and it launches "40% faster" - comparisons
to Netscape 7.0 shows similar performance gains on the Macintosh platform).
The KDE connection: "[f]or its Web page
rendering engine, Safari draws on software from the Konqueror open source
project. Weighing in at less than one tenth the size of another open
source renderer, Konqueror helps Safari stay lean and responsive.
"
The good news for Konqueror: Apple, which said that it will be
"a good open source citizen [and] share[] its enhancements with
the Konqueror open source community
", has today sent all
changes, along with a detailed changelog
, to the KHTML developers.
Congratulations to the KHTML developers for this recognition of
their outstanding efforts. Update @22:34: Dirk Mueller has
posted
an interesting mail from the Safari engineering manager as well
as his response. Hats off to collaboration!

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Comments

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ So, the only "right" thing to do, is to only do things that bennefit society as a whole? I'm sorry to say it, but the world is not that rosy, and I don't think it ever will be (and I'm not entirely sure I /want/ it to be in all respects). ]

Well, in general I believe you should try and do what is right not just for yourself but for everybody else too. I'm not especially religious, but it seems that this is important for society to work. That's kind of a fundamental assumption I've made as it transcends technology and is pretty general. If you think sometimes personal gain at the expense of others is OK, then my whole argument kind of falls down, and we'd have to try and argue that one out first.

[ In my oppinion there should *not* be any such laws. I don't want to live in a society where everything is controlled and regulated...... If you restrict the, so called, free market, is it then still "free" ? ]

Well the "free" market is something of a misnomer. In fact the market is quite heavily regulated even in America, which has the freest of all the markets. We have laws against attempting to create or extend monopolies for instance. That's because the free market is not in fact infallible, and it's perfectly possible to "play the system". We have laws against fraud, laws for enforcing contracts etc.... all that's needed to make the free market work smoothly, because otherwise you could warp the rules to your own advantage unfairly. So I don't think a law against proprietary platforms would be all that unreasonable.

[ A platform does not have to be something a lot of people use or even be publicly available to be "a platform". You could have a platform developed for a specific purpose for a specific (possibly closed) audience, and then develop applications for that platform - it's still a platform, and I don't think that it's nessesarily bad that such a platform be proprietary. It *may* be bad. ]

Well it really depends on scale. In principle, if an organization makes a proprietary platform on which 3rd parties build *competing* products, ie operating systems, then I think that is bad. On the other hand, if the platform is only used for non-competing products, perhaps all from the same company or doing very different specialist tasks then maybe that isn't so bad. I haven't given a great deal of thought to that situation.

In reality Apple aren't any threat realistically, I'm arguing it as a matter of principle. Apple will never have enough market share to pose any credible threat to either Microsoft or Linux, but nonetheless, I believe what they do is wrong anyway.

[ You are saying that you would be sued, but that the suit would be poinless. In that case you *are* free to develop it - it's only a matter of resources on your part to be able to win the lawsuit. ]

That was merely an example. There may well be patents on throbbing buttons or something, and anyway who is realistically going to fight a company with as much money and lawyers as vicious as Apples? It's not worth the trouble. Even if you did manage to do it, it'd be like Wine, an unofficial "ghost" implementation, not really a level playing field competition-wise.

[ And their existance is proof that it *is* possible to develop alternative platforms even though proprietary platforms are allowed and in widespread use. ]

Yes, but look at how hard it's been! Hundreds of thousands, if not millions of volunteers have put in over a decade of work and we're still not there! And Linux will have a viable chance of actually competing head on with Windows once Wine is nearly perfect, which won't happen for a long time :)

Using huge numbers of volunteers like this is a big economic hack basically. The fact that somehow it's all held together for so long isn't really a good way to say well proprietary platforms are OK because all you have to do to compete is to basically recreate computing from the ground up then give it away for free.

[ Yes, I mean exactely like 'nothing forces you to use Windows'. Just becourse some specific platform is in widespread use does not disallow you using something else. ]

No, but it can be made extremely hard. Luckily my job involves tools that are available on Linux, but many people need for instance Cubase VST (because all their musical works are in the VST file format) which of course only runs on Windows or the Mac, so I have to choose between them. I guess there are sequencers available on Linux but they are significantly behind VST so if I used them I'd find it much harder to compete for CD sales than it'd normally be.

So, it's not actually disallowed, but it's so hard for most people that it might as well be. Kind of like it's not impossible to give up crack, but crack addiction is still bad because it's so hard to stop.

[ You would still have the choice of finding or developing an alternative to that app (og pay someone else to do so). ]

At the risk of falling behind in the market because I spent my R&D budget on a Linux version of the app all my competitors were using, so now my products are more expensive and not as good, so I go bankrupt (simplistic but you get the idea).

[ It may be useless (to you), but that's not the point. The point is it's free and available .... ]

Well, if I want to use a MacOS app it's useless look at it that way. There are no apps out there that say "Darwin required" (unless they are ports of non-gui linux software). They all require MacOS which is closed. So other than a fun toy perhaps Darwin isn't all that useful.

[ > * I am against such things because they warp the natural laws of competition

In your oppinion. ]

Although some of my points are opinion yes, this is not one of them. The economic theory behind the way platforms warp the free market make sense, so far nobody has seen fit to dispute them. They do indeed restrict choice and often cause people to buy an inferior product to access their applications.

[ That may be true for some (even most) people, but not all. ]

Unfortunately economics is indeed majority rule. I'd like for all games to be released for Linux but they aren't, because economics dicatates that because I'm in the minority it's not profitable to do that, so I'm certainly affected by what other people choose to do.

[ Just becourse power is normally abused does not mean it's *always* abused. I don't agree to impose restrictions just becourse something *can* be abused or *often* is abused. Don't restrict by default - allow by default and then punish when abuse takes place. ]

Unfortunately as the Microsoft trial has shown, even if they had been effectively punished (which they weren't) we'd still all be using Windows. There is no good way legally to correct the aberrations caused by something like Windows (or macos) so it's best to prevent it in the first place.

[ Maybe they'll opensource the whole thing, maybe they won't... whatever they do we already did get *some* bennefit from the thing... ]

IMHO in the long term the con of having perhaps another Windows is far greater than the short term pro of having a nicer rendering engine.

[ Feel free to explain, but I won't promise I'll agree with your arguments. ]

Well, I have tried, it's pretty simple:

* There is no such thing as a free market, because pure capitalism doesn't work, it's unstable and tends to produce a society in which the strong trample the weak. In pure capitalism there is no justice.

* So we control the free market, with laws against monopolies, fraud, insider trading and so on. The market is not infallible, it can and is manipulated, so we try and prevent that.

* That's to ensure the market acts as free as possible, and it stays free, because that's how the majority are served best. When there is competition we all win.

* Platforms are unusual in that once you build something on them, you are then at the mercy of the platform creator. If they decide to stop supporting you, you need to upgrade (eventually). If they don't wish you to move to a competing platform, they can make it extremely hard or impossible for you to move.

* Hence the fact that Linux is developed by volunteers and given away for free yet still it's hard to make inroads into the desktop.

* These factors are why Microsoft is a monopoly.

* The free market cannot cope with platforms such as this on its own, and the legal system does nothing about them (they are too new really). So, because they are so dangerous, I oppose them, hence I oppose Apple and Microsoft (and Be Inc etc, though they are now dead, killed by the economics I now describe to you).

by Jiffy (not verified)

I looked through your recap and I still don't see what all the whining is about. Are you upset with Apple about something? They have comitted themselves to using an LGPL'd HTML rendering engine. Their adoption of that engine makes open internet standards more prevalent, something you seem to be demanding. Would you have preferred that they go ahead and use their own closed-source engine?

Perhaps you're upset because all the cheering is a little too general. Whatever you're so upset about, you are going to have to spell it out. So far, you have come off sounding like a raving lunatic.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ Perhaps you're upset because all the cheering is a little too general. Whatever you're so upset about, you are going to have to spell it out. So far, you have come off sounding like a raving lunatic. ]

I'm upset because other people are raving about how great Apple is, when in reality their goals do in fact conflict with the vision of society being in control of its own technologies again. They are just like Microsoft in terms of business model, but because rather than develop their own stuff they are using open source stuff suddenly they are saints. I have no problem with them using KHTML, I have a problem with people rationalising to themselves that actually the Mac is OK, when actually a proprietary OS *and* proprietary hardware is a step backward from where we are today.

by grabmeru (not verified)

[ I'm upset because other people are raving about how great Apple is, when in reality their goals do in fact conflict with the vision of society being in control of its own technologies again.]

Ahem... doesn't that actually read that their goals do obviously conflict with *your* vision of society.

Now - disagreeing with your opinion or visions doesn't automatically turn other poeple in a bunch of jerks mindlessly raving about a company's behaviour you obviously don't like.

If it's just that Apple didn't live up to your expectations, feel free to express that. However - please accept that other people have different expectations and choose to feel less disappointed. Since your're so fiercly defending the freedom of choice in computing, please give us the freedom of not being forced to buy into your "proprietary platform" when it comes to personal visions of society.

by Datschge (not verified)

So much whining and most of it is even off topic regarding the news. I think you just have way too much time, you better spend it for implementing commonly requested missing features to any open source environment of your choice. Your rambling here leads to nowhere.

by ahem! (not verified)

alrighty... so you want everyones computer to have the same chipset and same API frame work....

look to your OWN house first!

ever try to compile a version of Kopete for LinuxPPC? Don't worky.

So you must mean I must run the same chips as you to be within your utopia of societal control of technology.

And how exactly does this engender personal choice freedom? How is any diffrent then everyone being forced to drive the exact same car with same engine?

It don't.

You fail to see that anyone can write for the MacOS... write good clean code and use a cross platform UI widget set like TCL or QT both of which are supported natively by the Mac and hook into the carbon/cocoa API's.

You can then with extremely little work run it on Win or Linux.... How does that make the "platform" a factor?

Now you do have a point that Apple does not lay open the holy of holies to just anyone... so not every misanthropic script kiddy with a bad attitude and some time to kill can write yet another in a series of resource wasting hardware destroying viruses.

I will stick to my proprietary Mac OS thank you. I surf with near impunity... open what attachments suit my fancy... and don't fear every email like it was a package of white powder with a Kabul return address.

Now if you want that kind of access Apple does have a mechanism for it. You pony up the bucks let them know who you are, and if you do something really bad with the knowledge run the risk of them finding you and making your life a living hell. Its called accountability.

The system you espouse has far to great a risk of there being NONE.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ alrighty... so you want everyones computer to have the same chipset and same API frame work.... ]

Er, no. Where did I mention chipsets? Bytecode VMs and cross compilers make the underlying chipset nearly irrelevant.

[ ever try to compile a version of Kopete for LinuxPPC? Don't worky. ]

Sounds like a bug in Kopete to me (or Linux/PPC). I don't see the point of this, sorry.

[ So you must mean I must run the same chips as you to be within your utopia of societal control of technology. ]

Again, dunno what you're talking about. Chips? Where did chips come into this? You could run an open platform on a toaster, I couldn't care less.

[ You fail to see that anyone can write for the MacOS... write good clean code and use a cross platform UI widget set like TCL or QT both of which are supported natively by the Mac and hook into the carbon/cocoa API's. ]

That's fine, portable code doesn't give me cause for concern (although of course Qt is only a free platform on X11 based systems) However, there's a whole load of non-portable code out there, and Apple encourage this by providing the Carbon and Cocoa APIs. Where are the alternative implementations of these? I don't see them. I don't think I could build them either, where is the reference implementation, where is the royality free artwork (which is required for duping a platform as the Wine team will telly you). They don't exist, do they? None of the code Apple writes in is any way portable, so I'm not surprised Mac apps themselves aren't.

On the other hand, Linux software is plenty portable. If you have the source, you can just recompile, if you don't then you need to export the right ABI FreeBSD style, but all the code the app will link against is open source so there is virtually no cost to using Linux the platform, hence the large number of organisations that do so (redhat, debian etc).

[ You can then with extremely little work run it on Win or Linux.... How does that make the "platform" a factor? ]

A platform doesn't have to be provided by the native OS by the way. Java is a platform, but it lets you run software on all types of computers. So is Qt to a certain extent.

[ Now you do have a point that Apple does not lay open the holy of holies to just anyone... so not every misanthropic script kiddy with a bad attitude and some time to kill can write yet another in a series of resource wasting hardware destroying viruses. ]

I think you lost the plot. Viruses have nothing to do with it. Windows isn't open source either and that has lots of viruses - or had you forgotten that? MacOS doesn't have any viruses because it has such puny marketshare, similar situation to Linux.

Re: accountability, as I'm sure you're aware Microsoft is in exactly the same boat and they are plagued with viruses and hackers. Apple is hardly accountable either, what did its customers do when iTunes formatted their hard drives? Sue them? Of course not, Apple has way too much money.

by Chris Brien (not verified)

<>

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/apsl.html
The Apple Public Source License is not free. It is less free than many other licenses, and even includes a restriction which not even Microsoft are capable of including. Apple are not interested in free software. However, the Free Software Foundation are aware of what Apple does. Try having a look at the FSF boycott of Apple and their reasoning behind it.

by Ari Ukkonen (not verified)

Proprietary? Is my IDE drive proprietary? What about my GeForce2MX video? My PC133 Ram? Those USB Mice and keyboards that also work fine on my PC? Firewire? Airport a.k.a. WiFi? PCI slots? AGP slots?

Are you trying to tell me that all those PC's that ship by default with Windows XP are not running a proprietary closed os?

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ Proprietary? Is my IDE drive proprietary? ]

Yes, but that's OK, your IDE disk drive is not a platform. People don't extend it or build other technologies or products on your disk drive. IDE itself is pretty open.

[ What about my GeForce2MX video? My PC133 Ram? Those USB Mice and keyboards that also work fine on my PC? Firewire? Airport a.k.a. WiFi? PCI slots? AGP slots? ]

Ditto with the exceptions of WiFi, which is in fact an open platform, as is PCI as is AGP. There may well be licensing costs for those technologies, I don't know, but nonetheless there are multiple competing implementations and the culture is to allow and encourage them. WiFi, PCI and AGP are all well documented and anybody can use them.

Please distinguish between closed *platforms* (which I am against, which is why I'm against Apple) and closed *products*, which I am fine with.

Note that despite using large amounts of open techology, a Mac is in fact a proprietary platform because it's not possible for other people to build them - enough of the internals are Apple proprietary that you cannot build clones without their permission, which they never give.

[ Are you trying to tell me that all those PC's that ship by default with Windows XP are not running a proprietary closed os? ]

Huh? No, Windows XP is very much a proprietary closed platform. Where did I ever even imply that it wasn't? Windows is exactly the sort of dumb situation I want to see never happen again.

by Ari Ukkonen (not verified)

Mike, I don't see how you can reconcile being against what you would call a "proprietary" platform and yet you make a living writing proprietary software, as do I. I would guess that this software you develop runs on windows. Hypocrite. I'm for software choice when it comes to platforms and software and I fail to see how a closed source system hinders development of either closed or open source software by either apple or third parties.

BTW. The kernel and BSD subsystem (the OS) is open source, only the Aqua subsystem, filesystem and some bundled apps are closed source. IMHO, the OS is open source whereas the GUI and bundled extras are not.

Why don't you download Darwin for X86 some time?

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ Mike, I don't see how you can reconcile being against what you would call a "proprietary" platform and yet you make a living writing proprietary software, as do I. ]

Extremely easily. I'm not going to write what I've already written a hundred times in this thread already for you, read some of my other posts, then if you have *specific* queries about my arguments feel free to raise them.

[ I would guess that this software you develop runs on windows. Hypocrite. ]

I would guess that you need to prejudge people less, and start thinking more. In fact, the software I write is mainly java server based, and I work on Linux. It also runs on Windows, because Java is portable. That's OK, I'm writing apps, not platforms. Therefore calling me a hypocrite when in fact you have

a) Misunderstood my position completely and
b) Made wild assumptions about the work I do based on no evidence at all

just makes you look dumb.

[ BTW. The kernel and BSD subsystem (the OS) is open source, only the Aqua subsystem, filesystem and some bundled apps are closed source. IMHO, the OS is open source whereas the GUI and bundled extras are not. ]

Open source:
- Darwin (which is mostly FreeBSD which was already open source anyway)

Proprietary
- Quartz (graphics system)
- Aqua (widget toolkit)
- Carbon APIs
- Cocoa APIs (the bulk of the platform are in these two)
- Filing system
- Quicktime Sorensen
- IOKit/CoreAudio/other generic frameworks
- Dock/Control Panel/applets/gui tools (not really relevant to it being proprietary).

Hmm. It's closed source. If you've somehow managed to rationalise to yourself that you're actually using an open source OS then I'm impressed - if it was in fact a free platform however there would be a port for the PC already. As you no doubt realise, such a thing is impossible.

[ Why don't you download Darwin for X86 some time? ]

Because it almost certainly would not be compatible with enough of my hardware to be useful. Darwin being open source is a nice gesture (though consider it was largely already open source somewhat hollow), but ultimately pointless, we already have an excellent kernel with great hardware support and high performance in the form of Linux, another one isn't much use.

by Brian (not verified)

Mr. Hearn, you have spent a great deal of time raving with arguments that I and clearly most, if not all, others here believe are without substance. Why are you in such contradiction with the rest of the OSS community?

I believe you have a warped definition of the goal of OSS. The OSS community should not be about forcing all platforms to be open source, it should be about choice. Why do 90% of users use Windows? Because its a better OS? I argue that many, if not most, are forced too due to browser and software compliance. You will agree, I'm sure. But some people like Windows. More power to them, what do I care what they use- its their choice. Some, but not all are stupid and ignorant, and every reasonable human knows you can't argue with stupidity and ignorance. But I want my choice too. Therefore, I want compliance, and to not be forced to use someone's platform or application. Can proprietary software cause problems? Yes, example Microsoft. But clearly not in this case. Apple is not a threat to you, and they have behaved. What Apple has done here (yes, at the same time helping themselves) is provide better compliance for Konqueror- and we are a step closer to having choice. It levels the playing field, and allows more options- choice. This is good for OSS. Period.

-B

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

I have made my arguments very clear time and time again, and will continue to do so until somebody convinces me otherwise, which is most certainly possible but so far very few posts have even come close, they either flame me or make arguments which aren't actually related to what I was talking about (how will people get paid, it's about choice not freedom etc).

[ I believe you have a warped definition of the goal of OSS. The OSS community should not be about forcing all platforms to be open source, it should be about choice. ]

Actually it should be about freedom. You know, that's why it's called *free* software, not choice software. The GIMP is basically the only open source graphics tool of any merit, and as Photoshop doesn't yet run under Wine I guess I am "forced" to use it. But I don't care, because the gimp does what I want. If one day it didn't do that anymore, I could make it do what I want.

If it was, as you say, about choice, somebody would have started a competing project just to ensure nobody was "forced" to choose the Gimp.

[ But some people like Windows. More power to them, what do I care what they use- its their choice. ]

Unfortunately, their choices are not independant. I care what they use, because their choices affect me by reducing the number of apps available for my chosen platform. I choose Linux, but the choices of others means that Photoshop is not, and quite possibly never will be available to me natively. So what other people choose does indeed affect me, in a serious way sometimes, occasionally so much so that I am practically forced into going with their choices as well even if I don't agree with them.

Once you have argued successfully that we can all choose our platforms independant of each other, then I would no longer care because what does it matter what other people use? Unfortunately it does matter. That is central to my argument and I have gone into great detail about the economics behind this fact in other replies, so if you don't understand why platform choices aren't independant please look there first.

[ Apple is not a threat to you, and they have behaved. What Apple has done here (yes, at the same time helping themselves) is provide better compliance for Konqueror- and we are a step closer to having choice. It levels the playing field, and allows more options- choice. This is good for OSS. Period. ]

You are confusing short term practicality with long term inevitability. I'm sure they don't pose any realistic threat, I have covered that in other replies but in principle they wish for as many people as possible to use the Mac. Regardless of whether I wish to use their products or not then, that affects me. KHTML may be open source, but Safari is not, nor is MacOS.

OSS is here for the long term, so that's what I think about. Short term gain could be tomorrows pain.

by Just passing th... (not verified)

Your comments are practically verbatim of Richard Stallman. Disgusting.

Before you get your panties in a bunch, it would help if you knew my background. I'm a UNIX (note: not Linux) system administrator, and have been since 1992; you will find me running FreeBSD on all of my servers. However, you will find me -- happily, might I add -- running Windows XP on all of my workstations. I am what both the open-source community and the pro-Windows communities call "the devil's advocate." I appease to neither side, because I believe both sides have fundamentally wrong approaches to their products.

On open-source: I ran and used Linux vehemently from 1992 until 1997. I became completely and thoroughly disgusted with how purely chaotic the core of the Linux operating system became. Patches atop patches which didn't apply cleanly to previously patched versions, Alan Cox's "personal" patches, and "Enterprise" patches from vendors such as RedHat (I was a Slackware fan, for the record).

As I spent more and more time exposing myself to open-source software, I began to notice a similar trend throughout all communities: the meritless chaotic nature of OSS. OSS is idealised to be something that has no central management (see Richard Stallman's definition, re: "it's got us this far, so obviously it works"). Lack-of management means lack-of responsibility, and lack-of responsibility means trouble, especially for businesses (small, medium, or corporate).

Another major flaw with OSS is the fact that as a defense mechanism, OSS fans seem to believe that ever end-user knows how -- or wants to, for that matter -- read source code. Can you imagine my 75 year-old grandmother trying to figure out why her workstation no longer works due to a bug in the Linux IP stack? I sure can't. It's not a plausible mentality to think like that. Most (i.e. the majority of) end-users do not know how to read source, nor do they want to -- I myself am a great example of a programmer who can (and does) read source, but *refuses* to assist in the OSS model because I believe that software authors should take FULL responsibility for code they write, and not "pawn it off" onto The Community(tm) to maintain for them. I submit bug reports to authors, and in most cases, those bug reports are ignored. The concept of mass over quality doesn't work either -- just because you have 500,000 monkeys pounding away at 500,000 terminals doesn't mean your software is going to be 500,000 times better.

So tell me, how does the OSS model "work" as a replacement for responsibility? It doesn't -- and likewise, there is no way anyone is going to tell me otherwise. I've had over 10 years of dealing with OSS, and it saddens me that in that time, the lack-of responsibility from OSS authors has spread like a disease, rather than diminished.

On proprietary systems: Every proprietary system has it's place. The majority of products you use today, even things as simple as the pencil, are proprietary. Copyright laws, patents, and things like the DMCA (which, FYI, I am not entirely a fan of, but do not believe in standing against it) ensure that peoples' and companies' proprietary developments remain that way. With proprietary development comes the responsibility that OSS lacks. In this case, Apple's proprietary systems have been a source of love-hate relationships with not only their consumers, but potential consumers as well.

I myself purchased one of the brand-new 15" iMacs when they came out, and was thoroughly disgusted with the amount of bugs in OSX (so much that I ended up using OS9 instead). I was also disgusted with the fact that 45 days later, Apple released Jaguar -- and expected consumers to pay for the bugfixes. Then they released updated versions of their Powerbooks (moved from just DVD readers to DVD writers), but would not let customers return their recently-purchased products to get what was now better but cost the same. Then comes in the release of the 17" iMac, and the 17" Powerbook supporting Firewire2 and 802.11g. It hasn't even been a year since Apple last released a similar system -- yet they were expecting everyone to upgrade, and those who had fallen for the first batch essentially got fucked.

Apple's OSX software is taking a new approach to everything -- keeping the proprietary hardware aspect, while opening up to new ideas. OSX is what *IX systems running XFree86 have STRIVED to be for, gee what, 15 years now? Let's face it: X Windows is absolutely disgusting to look at, and it's even worse to set up (AccelX was the only software package -- commercial, mind you -- which made it easy). This is where Microsoft Windows wins out. However, Apple's OSX is essentially the best of both worlds: a gorgeous GUI combined with a stable and efficient BSD back-end. As an OSS advocate, you should be quite aware of how threatening OSX is.

As far as Windows goes, I really have no problem with it's "closed-source" mentality. I use the product, I enjoy the product, and the majority of the world uses the product. How can I lose? I can't. Besides, do I really want to sit around sifting through MILLIONS of lines of C++? No one does -- and I mean *NO ONE* (not even the government ;-) ). Likewise, I don't want to sit around sifting through 500 lines of C code of some *IX application who's author now lives in Tonga on a boat with no electricity, etc. etc...

Summary: It never ceases to amaze me how zealous OSS advocates are, even when it comes to their own community. They're just as bad as the zealots on the opposite end of the spectrum. OSS would hold more ground if its software authors were to take more personal responsibility for their authored software. OSS, to me, *IS* Microsoft. I hope that analogy makes sense (think about it for awhile).

Recommendation: Try opening your mind a little to new ideas. If Apple was out to Proprietize The World(tm), they wouldn't have bothered submitting a diff in the first place. And try to remember that Free is ***NOT*** always better.

by mac.zooks (not verified)

Even "non-profit" organizations have to make a profit in order to survive.

Everything that is produced has a cost. If costs are not recovered, for whatever reason, or are squandered, then bankruptcy ensues. Most of the time, that means going out of business -- sooner or later.

Is NetZero free? Not anymore. Is Yahoo mail free? Less and less as time goes on. And the mighty AOL is falling from grace within the very conglomerate it consumed because of falling revenue on it's own part.

Didn't a dot.com bubble burst in the not so distant past ??

I am no fan of the way great power is wielded by large corporations. At the same time, reality dictates:

Open source can not equal absolutely free source, otherwise, it would cease to exist.

There are far more devious companies and CEO's than Apple and Jobs which could be marketing "open source" material. Just remember which one is the monopoly-- which one has maneuvered a settlement where as much as 2/3 of the settlement can boomerang right back into that monopoly's lap.

Be thankful for small favors.

by Does it Matter (not verified)

I think you must be one of the most delusional zealots I have seen yet. I don't even know where to begin with the flaws in your thinking...

Let's start with you belief in open hardware. Guess what? There is no such thing. What do you use as a definition?

You think just because you buy some cheap ass motherboard from Tawain and throw an AMD processor in it that it is open? Guess what. They are all companies. Yep that's right the kind that makes money. You think that they don't give some of your money to some other patent holders? Guess what. All Hardware is patented and someone collects royalties. No such thing as an open hardware platform. OK, you say I can by Intel like processors from someone else. In the PPC world there are mutliple suppliers. You can actually buy PPC machines from different vendors and run any number of OSes on them including BSD and Linux. Pretty much open as far as I can see by your definition. All hardware is provided by companies. There is no benevolent hardware company doing it for the community. And you know what? WE like it that way. That way when we buy our Apple machines they actually work as a completed product not just a motherboard and a collection of parts thrown together.

If you hold such a desire for open hardware, what open hardware car do you drive? You know, the kind that you can throw any engine under the hood and well, I like that seat and steering wheel over there. Guess what? They don't make them that way. No real completed product works that way. Where is your open hardware refrigerator?

No, you are just coming down to the decision of which company to send your dollars to. Some of us think Bill has enough of it.

So given your list of 3 items above all computer companies are bad because they are all proprietary (meaning they are all making money, and you might want to check webster for a definition of proprietary). Well I guess you can build an abacus in your garage, better start working on that Linux port.

by Roberto J Dohnert (not verified)

What the hell are you smoking ? This is not a bad day for KDE or free software. We finally have the backing of a major company sending in code and its protected by the GPL. There is nothing bad about it. Do you even understand the concept of free software ? Apple is more open source and compliant than Lindows is. I dont see you trolling their boards making complaints. The fact is even with GPLed software Apple did not have to release the source code to the public. They could have put a price tag on Safari made you buy it and they would have only had to give you the source code to webcore if you requested it. Hell I can fork KDE make my own version of it release the source for the base that falls under the GPL BSD License my changes and charge for it. Apple made a very good choice in KHTML and they are complying as much as they need to and throwing the KDE team a few bones while doing it. The only complaints I see are from the Mozilla team which are pissed off and insulted because Apple didnt choose Gecko.

by John Randolph (not verified)

>I think this sucks.

Yeah, well: who asked for your approval?

-jcr

by JCR daddy (not verified)

Real intelligent comment, John.

Maybe tomorrow you can try growing up.

by ac (not verified)

John must be tired of Mike Hearn's mozilla propaganda too.

by Karikalan (not verified)

KHTML is open source and everyone (yes, that includes commercial companies that sell proprietory hardware and software) can use it, as long as they play by the rules.

Apple used it in Safari, and from all indications - has played by the rules. From all indications, KHTML developers received a lot of bug fixes from Apple developers. In less than 2 days, there are about half a million more people using a KHTML based browsers increasing its visibility, and recognition.

There should be no litmus test for any user to use open source software as long as they fulfill license requirements. Other considerations, IMO, are personal.

Karikalan

by user from greece (not verified)

lets see this from the end users view.

i like linux. i like the idea of free software but not most of its childs. i like the idea that there shouldnt be any proprietary code. i love the idea of one or two companys NOT having control over the platform that most users use.
i am not stuck whitout a choice in oses. id drop any that wouldnt fulfill my needs.

BUT!! i also hate the idea of everything being free. who will organize the whole thing? who will keep it working all together? a group of voluntiers who will with a clear and inocent mind coordinate all this? i dont think so. this would be worst than gates or jobs or anyone controlling a major amount of users. at least we know what we have to face. but the other way around it would probably be even worse. theyd go crazy. 10? 100? 1000? peolpe in control of what drives the world (and that is info and its medium - computers ) it would be the same. they are just people.

so i'd prefer to see microsoft, apple, ibm ,... and the free software community fighting for ever so we could have a balance. so let them use free code if that keeps the fight going on.

btw. a hard fact for which you are propably goin to hate me. the world DOES NOT give a shit if software is free or not. they want support they want the frikkin software to work. we end users dont pay for it anyway but bussiness does. so until you start providing support for all thigs GPLed ( which isnt humanly possible )and user friendlines ( im not talking about UIS and $hit im talking about istallation, about the dependency hell we got goin on in the linux world) stop bitchin and go write some A' quality code which history has proven the free software community is able to make ( e.g. konqueror ).

sorry for the bad english.

by user from greece (not verified)

sorry...

by Visitor (not verified)

Mike Hearn is unfair to Apple.

He does not seem to understand that many users
prefer proprietary platforms.

There are two things that have to be distinguished
here:

1.) what an OS does (function) and
2.) how it does it (implementation).

I believe that it should be clear to everyone
what an OS does, but that the implementation need not
be disclosed.

The difference between M$ and Apple is that Apple
complies with 1.) and M$ does not.

No proprietary platform is a threat if it's
functionality is properly disclosed because other platforms
can work towards implementing the same functionality.

The problem with M$ software generally, and IE specifically,
is that it's functionality is "secretive" and bizarre.

By basing their web browser on KHTML, Apple has made
a great step in complying with 1.). This is especially
important because WWW is such a mess.

Sincerely,
Visitor

P.S. Thanks to all for making Safari possible. It was one of the
best Christmas presents ever. Many celebrated Orthodox Christmas on
January 7th. It's so nice to finally have a Mac OS X browser which
properly renders pages containing text written in the language of at
least one large group of people who was celebrating Christmas the
very day Safari was unveiled.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ He does not seem to understand that many users
prefer proprietary platforms. ]

Most users of the road network would prefer not to have no-parking zones - what individuals want is not always what's best for all of us.

[ The difference between M$ and Apple is that Apple
complies with 1.) and M$ does not. ]

Hardly. Microsoft has massive and 95% complete documentation on all their APIs available at MSDN, we use it extensively when developing Wine. Apple may well have an equivalent, but to say Microsoft does not document it's stuff is an insult to them. Not everything is documented 100%, in particular the Office file formats are not, but then Apple are equally as bad at this (iPod on disk database format, AppleWorks formats, Sorensen Codecs etc).

[ No proprietary platform is a threat if it's
functionality is properly disclosed because other platforms
can work towards implementing the same functionality. ]

In theory correct. In practice if a platform is available royalty free for reimplementation by third parties and if the culture is to encourage such implementations (the W3C requires at least 2 interoperating implementations for a spec to move to Recommendation status) then it's probably not a proprietary platform.

In the case of Apple, it is in fact impossible to reimplement the functionality without getting immediate lawsuits from Apple. They have demonstrated this quite clearly already, and of course the amount of effort it'd take to catch up and stay caught up with MacOS is phenomenal. Wine is just about managing to not fall behind at the moment but it's still a long way from being a full reimplementation of the Win32 APIs.

The "culture" of MacOS is to disallow competing implementations, to make it hard for people to produce them and finally MacOS is not developed in public forums which are open to all. Therefore MacOS is in fact a proprietary platform, despite the existance of (some) documentation.

by Joe Millionaire (not verified)

I'll give you the iPod argument and AppleWorks but Sorenson codcs aren't Apple's fault - Sorenson is a company - bitch them out, but Apple had to pay them for the license to their codecs.

Additionally, Society reclaiming the right to its technology is a noble goal, but you might as well start bashing AT&T, Sprint, The Gas Company, Electric Company and Water Company - infrastructure has to be built by someone.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ Sorenson codcs aren't Apple's fault - Sorenson is a company - bitch them out, but Apple had to pay them for the license to their codecs. ]

Sure. But why do they still use them, when MPEG4 is a better codec anyway? Digital video has been around for yonks, they're not obliged to use sorensen.

[ Additionally, Society reclaiming the right to its technology is a noble goal, but you might as well start bashing AT&T, Sprint, The Gas Company, Electric Company and Water Company - infrastructure has to be built by someone. ]

Good point, but AT&T were in fact found to be a monopoly and broken up, dunno about Sprint (not american). Utility companies are often state owned, and when they aren't at least there's some semblance of competition, although often it's a bit of a facade.

That's a different problem entirely though....

Sure infrastructure has to be built, but so far we've managed OK with most of the rest of our infrastructure, that's either ended up being a free market with competition (mostly) or government owned. Computer platforms aren't either of these things and as I prefer (1) to (2)......

by Christopher Blo... (not verified)

[ Sure. But why do they still use them, when MPEG4 is a better codec anyway? Digital video has been around for yonks, they're not obliged to use sorensen.]

MPEG4 is not free.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

It is however significantly more open than Sorensen.

by Christopher Blo... (not verified)

[In the case of Apple, it is in fact impossible to reimplement the functionality without getting immediate lawsuits from Apple. They have demonstrated this quite clearly already,]

Source?

[Wine is just about managing to not fall behind at the moment but it's still a long way from being a full reimplementation of the Win32 APIs.)

Yes, but i'm sure that the WINE project is not implenting MS code in their project?

[ The "culture" of MacOS is to disallow competing implementations, to make it hard for people to produce them and finally MacOS is not developed in public forums which are open to all. Therefore MacOS is in fact a proprietary platform, despite the existance of (some) documentation.]

Again, give us examples.. OS X is indeed a proprietary platform except for the CoreOS (Darwin BSD), the webbrowser, CDSA, CUPS, Open Directory, OpenPlay, Rendezvous, HeaderDoc, DarwinStreaming Server, X11 and of course the Chess.app ;)

That's the difference between MS and Apple. Apple is no opensource company, but the fact that they are using opensource widley in their OS cannot be misstaken.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ Source? ]

See the numerous people who have attempted to make an Aqua style theme and got sued. Mac apps are built around the idea that they'll be run in an aqua environment, so you have to emulate the gui exactly to run mac apps on other platforms. An L&F isn't legally protectable, but they do this anyway.

[ Yes, but i'm sure that the WINE project is not implenting MS code in their project? ]

Hmm? Wine is a reimplementation of lots of MS code yes.

[ Again, give us examples.. ]

IOKit, CoreAudio, Carbon, Cocoa, Quartz, Aqua, desktop tools, applets, interface builder etc.

Note that BSD was already open, the Safari web browser isn't open source in fact (only khtml is, which was already open source), CUPS was developed originally for Linux so was already open source, X11 and Rendezvous are protocols etc...

Microsoft use BSD code in Windows as well you know, does that make Microsoft an open source company?

by Christopher Blo... (not verified)

[ See the numerous people who have attempted to make an Aqua style theme and got sued. Mac apps are built around the idea that they'll be run in an aqua environment, so you have to emulate the gui exactly to run mac apps on other platforms. An L&F isn't legally protectable, but they do this anyway.]

See the numerous of pepole who in fact include Aqua in themes and apps (like AquaFix and Max Rudgrens Apple is Lazy, OrborX for Xwin) that are not being sued. Apple sued pepole in the begining of Aqua for market reasons. Yes, that sucked. I think so also. But now, nah don't think you will get sued.. The net is swarming over with Aqua themes and Icons..

Anyways i don't know what GUI widgets has to do with the discussion.
Apple have Guidelines for implenting GUI in Aqua. Becuase you don't want an consumer desktop os to have diffrent GUI widgets and shortcuts in every app.

If you having a hard time to port an OS X app to another OS simply becuase of the GUI. I hardly think you will have any experience of porting OS X apps to other plattforms.

[Hmm? Wine is a reimplementation of lots of MS code yes.]

Reimplementation. Thats totally different than in fact using MS code directly from MS.'

[IOKit, CoreAudio, Carbon, Cocoa, Quartz, Aqua, desktop tools, applets, interface builder etc.

Note that BSD was already open, the Safari web browser isn't open source in fact (only khtml is, which was already open source), CUPS was developed originally for Linux so was already open source, X11 and Rendezvous are protocols etc...

Microsoft use BSD code in Windows as well you know, does that make Microsoft an open source company?]

Desktop tools? What are these? The finder? Build your own finder.
You are missing the point here. Don't compare to MS.
Apple is not an open source company and they never will. But they do build their OS around lots of Opensource software and implentations.

MS use some BSD code in Windows, but they don't build thier OS around it.

That's the power of open source. Companys and OSes that are not Open source can benefit of Open Source and then give back to the community. It's not exclusive to GNU OS.

Then finally it's up to you what you want to run. Gnu OS Linux, QNX, OS X, WinXP, FreeBSD or something else..

Do remember that everyone is not thinking the same way you do.

by Mike Hearn (not verified)

[ But now, nah don't think you will get sued.. The net is swarming over with Aqua themes and Icons.. ]

Who knows? Bit risky legally. Maybe they will, maybe they won't.

[ If you having a hard time to port an OS X app to another OS simply becuase of the GUI. I hardly think you will have any experience of porting OS X apps to other plattforms. ]

It's not just the GUI, it's all the other APIs too. Actually the hardest part of writing cross platform software is the GUI system, because they are so complex and there is so much of it. Wine has to reimplement all the Windows common controls, there are many, and they aren't even using copyrighted artwork! It still takes forever, a drastic measure for sure.

[ Desktop tools? What are these? The finder? Build your own finder.
You are missing the point here. Don't compare to MS.
Apple is not an open source company and they never will. But they do build their OS around lots of Opensource software and implentations. ]

Yes, finder, shell (menu bar), dock, applets etc. So? This is the core of my issue with this. It doesn't matter how much Apple use open source code. They have the same aims and use the same methods as Microsoft do to lock in their customers. Using open source code is not in itself a good thing, never has been, never will be. Open source volunteer based development is simply a good way to take on the huge amount of work necessary to create an OS and all the apps.

[ Then finally it's up to you what you want to run. Gnu OS Linux, QNX, OS X, WinXP, FreeBSD or something else.. ]

Well no, to a large extent it's not up to me. Sometimes I have to use Windows at work, because I need to use apps that do not exist on Linux and won't work in Wine. I'm being forced to use something against my will. I'm lucky, at least I can use Linux most of the time. Many many people cannot even do that. So to pretend that anybody can choose is wrong, often they can't. Apple know this, and are trying very hard to force people to use their products, even if they don't want to. Where did the Windows version of Logic Audio go? Oh, Apple pulled it, so all the logic users must now buy macs or abandon the product and lose all the music they wrote (closed file formats).

Do you see why I am against Apple? It matters not how much open source code they use, the sort of company they are is plain to see.

by Christopher Blo... (not verified)

[what individuals want is not always what's best for all of us.]

So used the Chinese Communist party say..

[AppleWorks formats, Sorensen Codecs etc]

Apple Works is dead. Sorenson Video is not from Apple.

Finally.. What this thread is all about.
Do you think that Apple using KHTML is hurting the Open Source community?

The speeds are better, less memory, and far less processor. I also like the google bar up top.
Nice, very nice.

by IR (not verified)

Safari Downloads Top 500,000
Friday January 10, 12:37 pm ET

MACWORLD EXPO, SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 10 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Apple® (Nasdaq: AAPL - News) today announced that users have downloaded more than 500,000 copies of its new Safari(TM) web browser since the free public beta was posted on Apple's web site (www.apple.com) on Tuesday, January 7

http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/030110/sff035_1.html