From: burley@geech.gnu.ai.mit.edu (Craig Burley) Subject: Re: DOS/MS Windows compatibility for Free Software Date: 9 Jun 1992 19:13:09 GMT
The FSF's main focus, as I understand, is Project GNU -- GNU's Not UNIX.
Things like MS-DOS support take a back seat.
As more people offer to help write free software, it is not surprising that
some of them will have skills such as supporting MS-DOS environments in
free-software environments such as Linux, Hurd, and so on.
I doubt any FSF people, rms in particular, will discourage such people from
working on such projects just because the results of their work might appear
to benefit commercial software developers. After all, the existence of gcc
and GNU EMACS can be said to have benefitted commercial software developers
as well.
If we end up with free software that runs UNIX software, MS-DOS software,
and Mac software, along with any others, then users with existing investments
in those various environments will have their needs well met by free software.
Such users will likely then learn the advantages of using free software as
far as making copies, having access to source code (and the rights to change
it), and so on.
Then, those users will probably begin to realize that those advantages do not
extend to the older software they're running in "compatibility mode(s)"
provided by free software. For example, a user running Hypercard under a
Mac emulator in Linux, or a user running Lotus 1-2-3 under an MS-DOS emulator
in Hurd, will notice that no source code or rights for making copies for
friends and neighbors are available for those applications.
At that point, newer free software designed to replace those applications and
not have to run in the (presumably slower) compatibility modes will likely
reach a receptive audience.
Therefore it seems unreasonable to worry about people writing free MS-DOS
emulators or free Mac-OS emulators (except that those people might have to
worry about litigation by Microsoft or, especially, Apple). As a free-
software user, enthusiast, and author myself, I'd be delighted to have
access to free MS-DOS and Mac emulators under Linux, Hurd, 386BSD, or
whatever.