On Fri, 17 Dec 2004 14:52:56 -0800, Brian Nelson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said:
> Glenn Maynard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>> On Fri, Dec 17, 2004 at 11:07:31AM -0800, Brian Nelson wrote:
>>> No, a definition of "software" was never decided upon. The vote
>>> was about removing the word "software" in certain places from the
>>> DFSG, regardless of its definition.
>>
>> However, the S in DFSG means "software"; the SC was adjusted to say
>> that everything in Debian is judged by the DFSG, but the DFSG was
>> not renamed (for example, to mean "Debian Free Stuff Guidelines").
>> This means, to me, that everything in Debian is Software.
> I'd say it's just there by legacy.
>> It's a moot issue, anyway; any time the dictionary lawyers nitpick
>> "software", the real point is probably long lost, anyway ... :)
> Sure, how bout this:
> It seems to me that if you're saying everything in Debian is
> software, then your definition of software must be something
> equivalent to "information stored in a way that can be read by a
> machine".
No. Information encoded electronically, in 0's and 1,
usually.
Things related to computers are either software, hardware, or
wetware.
> In that case, you'd certainly agree that the information
> stored on a punch card is software.
Umm, no. Nor is stuff on a printed page that can be scanned
using OCR. The card is physical, I can feel it, make holes in it, and
it is hardware.
When read by a card reader (or when a page is scanned in), it
gets an electronic representation in the machine, and then is software.
Since thge rest of your post proceeds from this false premise,
I am eliding it.
manoj
--
A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse! Wm. Shakespeare, "Henry
VI"
Manoj Srivastava <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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