Portability and usage statistics (was Re: Seppuku and x_IO_error_handler() )

"sb" == SL Baur <steve(a)xemacs.org&gt; writes: sb> sb> sb> sb> The statement is absolutely true under the condition given in the sb> footnote: sb> You can't dispute raw numbers, but I don't think this is an accurate usage indicator. I'd venture that most of the non-Linux binary kit downloads are used by more than one person (does an average of 10 sound reasonable?), while most Linux downloads are single-user. That's definitely true. No matter how good Linux is or will become, large corporations will go commercial every time. It's one thing to use free software for utilities, but it's an entirely different story when you're talking about the OS. As for the portability issue mentioned at the start of this thread, I've already run into problems with some other packages, and it's pretty frustrating when you're on the wrong end of it. A while back I was looking for a music CD player to run on our HPUX machines and most of what I found was Linux-only. Besides containing hardware-specific code, there were unconditional hardcoded references to linux/* header files--not a chance of making it work. I realize that most of the people developing packages such as this are doing so with Linux as the only available platform, but it really limits the "market" for their end product. Maybe they don't really care, but I think *we* should if we want XEmacs to be available to as many people as might want to use it. sb> That's undoubtedly true. How much does it skew the numbers? I don't sb> know. The number is complicated by the fact that many XEmacs users sb> use it on multiple platforms including Linux at home. Do you count sb> them twice? I'd estimate that maybe 10% of the software people I deal with have Linux at home. Most of them are Prisoners of Bill when they're on their own time. :-( sb> I'm vaguely interested in getting an order of magnitude (or two) sb> count, but not enough to want to invade people's privacy. I can vouch for my site, whose free software directory is mirrored to selected General Motors and Delphi Automotive sites around the world. A couple of months ago I put an invocation wrapper around XEmacs to log usage and counted 275 different users over a 2 week period. These people are all using SunOS and HPUX binaries I built and installed from the source distribution. -- Mike Scheidler c23mts(a)eng.delcoelect.com Corporate Software Technology Delphi Delco Electronics Systems PHONE: (765) 451-0319 Kokomo, IN 46904-9005 GMNET: 8-322-0319