Carcharoth wrote:
On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 5:57 PM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
Carcharoth wrote:
On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 1:50 PM, Sam Korn wrote:
On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 1:47 PM, Thomas Dalton wrote:
2009/2/16 Alvaro García:
Doesn't the -ware suffix only show that the software isn't paid?
No... the "free" part shows that. The "ware" part shows that it's software...
But, generally, yes: "freeware" means free-gratis, not free-libre.
And the -ware suffix does show that it is a product.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/-ware
That article's a bit rubbish, but gives you some idea.
Treating "ware" as a suffix is what makes it rubbish as much as anything else. "Ware" is the root noun in the word, and it would be more correct to treat "free-" or "share-" or "soft-" as attributive prefixes.
Interesting. I wouldn't disagree, and "ware" (usually plural) is a word in its own right. How would *you* reorganise things relating to "ware" on Wikipedia? There is Ware (disambiguation) and the town. Where do you go from there?
I would remove the hyphen from the entry, and rename the page to [[Ware (commodity)]]. Alternatively, the small town could be moved to [[Ware, England]]. There is also the argument that this all belongs in Wiktionary, where the entry is similarly screwed up, even to the point of suggesting that "ware" is in computer parlance is backformed from "software"
Apart from that the basic ideas are there; they just need to be re-organised.
Ec