[toothbrush]

Libre software and the associated freedoms aren't (or shouldn't be, at least!) "hipster stuff"! They are also in no way in conflict with Proper Science. One might almost argue that with regards to reproducibility of results, Proper Science demands a certain amount of Freedom.

[orkoden]

If you still have scientific equipment running Red Hat 6.2, you're not a lot better off.

[toothbrush]

If it's Libre (which i suspect RH isn't — but i am no expert) then all the source code should be available, and presumably you could hack the drivers (or whatever) to work with whatever new-and-improved hardware/software you want to run. That's kind of the point of Libre.

But perhaps i'm missing your point about RH?

[toyg]

read my post again: most manufacturers have no time for this sort of diatribe, and most users have no time or inclination to "hack the drivers" -- especially in rigid "efficiency-first" organisations like the military.

[toothbrush]

Still, if the choice is between

a) throw away a $300,000 piece of equipment for lack of drivers, assuming the company producing it has disappeared without all trace

or

b) spending less than $300,000 on employee time to make it work again

then to me case b sounds preferable, even in efficiency-first organisations. The military, i don't know. All i'm saying is that b wouldn't even be feasible without stuff being Libre, so diatribe or not, it actually would benefit public, private and commercial users' interests.

Anyway, probably i'm too optimistic about things.