Well, those are typically handled at a deeper level yes.

In the case of your average Linux distro, the drivers would be handled either kernel level or by a separate firmware package. Occasionally a subpackage might be required but it's all in the background in most cases.

In the case of Fedora, things like VLC often make use of nonfree software such as licenced codecs, and Fedora is first and foremost about FOSS. To resolve this, there is a separate repository for non-free software.

Packages not directly packaged by the RHG or Fedora Group can show up in COPR, a sane version of PPAs. I say saner, because it's centrally organized, unlike PPAs, where they often go, "Connect to this address and hope it still exists".

Well that explains why I had such a repugnant reaction to Fedora. I HATE! the FOSS community. While I will use open-source software if it's good and suits my needs I actively avoid 100% free code. Which is pretty easy to do in all honesty.

And that explains why we have such different opinions. I actively seek out FOSS programs. I like to be able to look at the code of programs I run.

Holy crap, do you have a reading disability?

20+ years of experience is not equivalent to 20 years ago.

Nevermind, it's irrelevant. You've made my point for me. Thank you for that.
I love it. People attempting to coerce a more fleshed out response. Let me break reality to you :

I don't have time nor the inclination to teach, much less to people whose views are so irretrievably entrenched bordering on religious fervor that it'd be wasteful, and much less for free. Though, go ahead and ad honinem away and just lump me under that banner if it makes you not have to consider my original statement. Willful ignorance is comfortable.

Edit : typo.

You must understand, outside server administration, Linux is an OS for people who want to dick with their computers moreso than do anything productive. It's the computer version of hipsters.

I can understand your repulsion, but a lot of games wouldn't be on GOG without the help of open source or shared source libraries.

At least Fedora lets you enable the repositories.

The games on gog are NOT open source. Developers have dug up some of their source code and given them to the guys at gog so they could reverse engineer them but are not actually available on github or public portals.

The games, certainly. But the libraries and DLLs to get them running or otherwise patch them, I most certainly would think otherwise.

This is absolutely true and over the lifecycle of the console, the APIs and hardware typically become more familiar and this aids development. PS2 and 3 are perfect examples; the hardware was notoriously difficult to work with and, once people got their heads wrapped around them, the game and graphics quality improved noticeably. Of course, it didn't help anything that Sony designed them this way intentionally to have this happen. But that's incidental...

His point is knowledge in development on PC's carries forward better than on consoles. PC's are still the same CISC architecture, albeit with multiple cores now and mandating threading and parallel-programming to get all the performance out of them (tricky/difficult). OpenGL is largely deprecated in favor of Vulkan and DirectX has major changes each release that necessitate large swaths of relearning, but a lot of programming knowledge will still apply, whereas with consoles it's usually just abstract application of knowledge if the architecture has changed dramatically.

Mind you, I'm talking mainly about AAA title programming where you're probably using an engine that you licenced. DirectX is backwards compatible thanks to using COM, so, if you wanted to just put out an indie game, you could easily just target 9.0c or OpenGL of just about any version.




What specific open-source libraries? Which ones?

Yes, that's fine with me. I've always been of the opinion that free and proprietary software are not mutually exclusive.

I think proprietary works well for application-level stuff, usually facing a non-technical end-user (OS and core utilities to use your system non-withstanding).

Where I think close-source proprietary works less well is for developer-facing utilities (OSes, databases, programming languages, web servers, code management tools, etc).

I think the lower you go, the worse proprietary software becomes.

I don't see the upside to forcing all kinds of proprietary restrictions and prohibitively expensive licenses on people making software. It just stifles innovation.

I follow this philosophy myself. The generic code that I write which is not overly specific to a particular application, I tend to put as open-source. It doesn't have that much monetary value, but if it can save someone some trouble, then all the better. If by using my stuff, they do some troubleshooting expose issues to me, that's terrific and if they actually get to the point where they fix some of the issues in my stuff for me, I'm in heaven.

Confirmation bias is not objective fact. Take a look :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems

Well, ScummVM in the entirety, for example. But I'm not about to pour over every single file in my installed games and match them to open projects.

zlib.dll
libogg.dll
libvorbis.dll
In lots of "proprietary" Windows™ games. :) Even the newest ones.

And, of course, DOSBox, GOG's bread and butter (to which GOG doesn't contribute much, AFAIK)!

Now that I think about it, a lot of sounds and music are sometimes converted into better formats too. Myst Uru had a ogg converter used on it for sure.

That's fair enough. I think my philosophy is a little more pragmatic though. Specially it's based on capitalism and results. Open source is fair enough but only if it achieves the desired results for both the user and the product.

Source code is the fruit of labor for both professional programs and industry leaders. Members of the Linux community are notorious for not only preferring open source but down right despising closed source software. Some of the more fanatical members fit into what is called the FOSS (Free and open source software) community. These guys enrage me because they remind me of communists. They will bully software developers for not going the open source rout and pressure others to do the same.

This is not only unethical it’s downright disgusting. It’s up to the people who own the source code to decided weather or not they want to share it and if the answer is no they should be left alone.

Were the Linux desktop distros come into this is that they react to the closed source industry. Often you’ll hear things such as “such and such company or entity doesn’t play nicely with open source” This is putting the cart before the hours. It’s Linux that doesn’t play nicely with closed source software not the other way around.

Until it does not only is Linux not likely to ever get anyway I don’t even want it to. It has to build first and not tear down.

I’m not convinced that open source is a good idea for an operating system because it hasn’t really amounted to anything. The best thing to come from Linux was Android but that it locked down and tightly controlled by Google.

Whether it’s the result of bad code or no one putting it to good use, Linux distros stand as a prime example of how open source when taken to the extreme results in a whole lot of free bread that no one in their right mind would want to eat.

Oh, OK, I got confused because you mentioned Ubuntu in the same post.