Re: [XEmacs-20.3/Gnus] invalid regexp in nndoc.el

[Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@srce.hr>]

Karl Kleinpaste <karl@jprc.com> writes:

> Er, I suppose I must instead say, "used to support."  It seems that,
> as of 19.16, the NEWS file for XEmacs has undergone a politically
> correct, or perhaps lawyerly correct, revision.  In 19.14, `C-h n'
> brings up the NEWS file containing this longish diatribe from Ben Wing
> on why fsfmacs and XEmacs seemed doomed never to merge:

Ben's post was lovely, but it was taken wrongly by many people, so it
was replaced for a politically correct blurb.  With the current
maintainer teams, there are two reasons why XEmacs and FSFmacs will
never merge:

1) Copyright assignments.

Major parts of XEmacs have not been assigned to the FSF (although they 
are GPL-ed), and their authors do not plan to assign them.  Not
requiring legal papers at gunpoint has been XEmacs' policy from time
immemorial, and changing it to require them strictly would piss off a
lot of people who contribute.

2) The matter of control.

Richard Stallman controls FSF Emacs with an iron fist.  He can and
does accept or deny a feature simply because he does or does not
"like" it, often with too little sense for the user base.  The
uncounted examples have proven this, including but not limited to
Ange-ftp fiasco in v19 and MULE fiasco in v20 FSFmacs.  The infamous
matter of "Croatian" language probably falls to the same category.

Even if, by some magic, the Emacsen merged right now, they would
probably split up again immediately, because Stallman would step on
someone.  Hard.

Which brings us to an optional third reason:

3) The matter of hurt feelings.

Finally, many of the people who were hurt by Stallman before simply
don't want to have anything with him.  When I contacted that person,
the first thing he asked me when he found I helped maintain XEmacs was
to stop working on it, because it "hurts the GNU project."  I find it
impossible to cooperate with him on that basis -- but that's just me.


I am now committing a cardinal sin by mailing this message to a
totally unappropriate group, and I beg for forgiveness.  I also beg
for all the responses to go to me privately, where I'll be happy to
discuss XEmacs and stuff with anyone who cares.

-- 
Hrvoje Niksic <hniksic@srce.hr> | Student at FER Zagreb, Croatia
--------------------------------+--------------------------------
* Q: What is an experienced Emacs user?
* A: A person who wishes that the terminal had pedals.