From: Niall O Broin (niall at domain linux.ie)
Date: Sun 30 Sep 2001 - 13:18:03 IST
On Sat, Sep 29, 2001 at 11:34:47PM +0100, Eugene O'Leary wrote:
> I recently installed Red Hat 7.1 from two disks which a friend had burned
> for me, from a free disk that he got with a PCW magazine.
> I was in the computer section of Eason's today and saw Red Hat 7.1 and Red
> Hat 7.1 Professional for sale. ( Boxed versions).
> 7.1 cost £106, and 7.1 Professional cost £199. Some people really cash in on
> what others have meant to give away for free! I came to the conclusion that
> the manuals must be written on gold-leaf!!!
You came to the wrong conclusion, and you really need to read up on the
distinction between free and free - libre and gratis in French, or speech
and beer in English.
Linux is free in the libre sense, but anybody can sell it for whatever they
want. Red Hat, along with most distributors, package Linux together with
many other pieces of software to make a working system, and they then sell
CDs with this distribution, manuals and support. They also make the
distribution available for download over the net.
When you buy a boxed set from RH you're getting manuals, CDs, and install
support. If you don't value that, then you don't buy the boxed set. The RH
Professional set is a little different as it comes with tryouts/licenses for
some commercial software - exactly what, you can see on their web site.
Again, if you don't value what's provided, you don't buy it.
Niall
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