The future of fortune(6)
Farhan Khan
khanzf at gmail.com
Wed Nov 29 01:27:14 UTC 2017
Hi Chris,
Thank you for your response. I must disagree.
A) If your concern is heritage, people can look into the BSD history.
This is readily available online.
B) If you feel there is utility, `pkg install fortune`. Everyone is happy.
I am not certain how my previous email came off as rude. Perhaps a loss
of tone in my voice over email? If you knew me in person, you would know
that I did not intend any disrespect.
Thanks!
Farhan
On 11/28/2017 07:19 PM, Chris H wrote:
> On Tue, 28 Nov 2017 18:34:24 -0500 "Farhan Khan" <khanzf at gmail.com> said
>
>> On 11/28/2017 05:11 PM, freebsd at johnea.net wrote:
>> > On 2017-11-26 21:46, Cy Schubert wrote:
>> >> In message <307f8e8d0ad15d2d00e74a9b602c8c19 at udns.ultimatedns.net>,
>> "Chris
>> > H" writes:
>> >>> On Sun, 26 Nov 2017 09:11:43 -0800 "Cy Schubert"
>> <Cy.Schubert at komquats.com>
>> > said
>> >>>> In message <20171126163259.6fb55366 at gumby.homeunix.com>, RW via
>> > freebsd-hackers writes:
>> >>>>> On Sun, 26 Nov 2017 07:59:52 -0800 Cy Schubert wrote:
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>>> Lastly. I'm not totally against games. My 4 and 5 year old
>> grandkids
>> >>>>>> play games on game tablets. However I would never let my grandkids
>> >>>>>> even see what fortune spits out. Much of it was offensive. I would
>> >>>>>> have been ashamed had they seen some of the outputs.
>> > > This statement is factually incorrect.
>> > > It just is not the case.
>> > > I've received fortune in email every morning for about 14 years.
>> That's well
>> > over 5000 fortunes. I've never seen even vaguely offensive content.
>> > > The default settings do not deliver patently offensive content,
>> period.
>> > >>>>>
>> >>>>> You have to try quite hard to find them, they aren't given by
>> default,
>> >>>>> and:
>> >>>>>
>> >>>>> $ fortune -o
>> >>>>> No fortunes found
>> >>>>> in /usr/share/games/fortune:/usr/local/share/games/fortune.
>> >>>>
>> > ...
>> >>>> It's 2017. If Red Hat doesn't support fortune why should we?
>> >>> OK this is the 2nd time you've said that, and I'm afraid I'm going
>> to have
>> > to
>> >>> respond. :)
>> >>> FreeBSD is *not* Red Hat, nor any other "flavor" of Linux. Who
>> cares if
>> > some
>> >>> other flavor of OS does, or does not "do it".
>> >>> Sorry. I *greatly* appreciate that FreeBSD is /different/ than all
>> the
>> > Linux
>> >>> flavors, and would dearly hate that it felt that it should feel/be
>> "Linux
>> > lik
>> >>> e".
>> >>> Over sensitive? Perhaps. But I simply couldn't resist.
>> >>>
>> >>> I'm done now. :)
>> >>
>> >> Of course FreeBSD isn't a Linux distro however RH has probably
>> learned that
>> >> contentious issues like this aren't worth the risk and exposure and
>> the
>> >> cost of supporting such software. FreeBSD is a volunteer effort.
>> >> Unnecessary software still exacts a cost even in an environment
>> like ours.
>> >>
>> > > I have to agree with the negative reaction to the Red Hat comparison.
>> > > Saying that FreeBSD obviously isn't linux doesn't address the
>> concern over
>> > this comparison.
>> > > If you think fortune is a flame war lightning rod, maybe you
>> haven't heard of
>> > systemd?
>> > > systemd is a Red Hat product.
>> > > There are many different reasons for the controversy over systemd.
>> One of
>> > them is that it removes the individuality of adopting distributions,
>> making
>> > them more uniform. The corporation in charge of that uniformity
>> being Red Hat.
>> > > People don't like the elimination of fortune for the same reason
>> they didn't
>> > like the politically-correct-ification of beastie: It makes the OS
>> seem less
>> > like something made by individuals for individuals, and more like a
>> polished,
>> > "risk and exposure" averse, corporate product. In a word, dehumanized.
>> > > johnea
> Respectfully re-flowing your *disrespectful* Top Post
>> (I write this with a respectful tone in my voice.)
>>
>> With respect, FreeBSD is an operating system, not a person to be
>> dehumanized. If you so strongly desire to run fortune, do a quick `pkg
>> install fortune`. You can continue to utilize this feature as you
>> please. Problem solved. No one is censoring anyone's speech, just
>> install it from the packages. It will likely take literally 2 seconds.
>>
>> Being relatively new to FreeBSD on my servers, I always found fortune
>> by default as unbecoming of an enterprise-class operating system. It
>> would be like having lolcats or cowsay on by default.
>>
>> You can continue to have the morning email with a fortune quote, you
>> will not lose that functionality. Everyone wins.
>>
> END re-flow
>
> What I think many responding to this thread may not understand; is that
> for some (many?) of us, the source referred to, we have been cobbling on,
> and using for 30+ years. In fact fortune(6) (as Shawn noted earlier)
> *predates* FreeBSD; or more accurately; the BSD. Point being; fortune(6)
> (as well as it's growing data set) is a part of it's heritage. Call
> it sentimental if you like. But there's not a hell-of-a-lot of that
> heritage left. fortune' data set, for the most part, is quite harmless,
> and often, fairly witty. You must directly request the portion that
> (apparently) some might find offensive. But in reality, it's really
> only references to part of global history. I experienced far worse than
> this in my history classes in grade && high school. That being WWII
> films that graphically depicted the atrocities imposed/inflicted on
> so many the victims. Should we eliminate world history classes, because
> some students might not like what they hear, and see? Hell, why not
> eliminate school entirely then?
> The point I'd like to make here; is that fortune(6), and it's
> accompanying data sets are *not* harmful. They are one of the *few*
> bits left of the *original* BSD, and should be allowed to stay as-is,
> for posterity. Even tho many of the new-comers don't completely
> understand.
>
> Thank you for listening.
>
> --Chris
>
>
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