A meal at MIRL'ens

Bubba and Travis met for lunch at a fast food restaurant. Travis' metabolism was that of a greyhound, and he ordered liberally. Bubba was more conservative with a small Coke and a small ice cream cone. The conversation turned to End User License Agreements, and Travis asked Bubba, "Have you seen some of the newer Open Source Software EULAs?"

"You talkin' 'bout the ones that just say GPG2? Yeah... anything's better than Microsoft!"

Travis contemplated this, and decided that, (in order to obtain time to eat,) he was going to have to get Bubba to redeliver one of his canned soap box speeches. He reasoned that the review would benefit them both, and sallied forth with the request, "Could you go over that one for me, one more time?"

"Well Travis, in my opinion Microsoft uses it's EULAs to keep all Microsoft Developers subsidiary to its own Research and Development." Bubba licked the drips of ice cream carefully, so as not to spill any.

"How so?" Travis replied when he finished his bite.

"You know all this Travis. One of these days I'm gonna have a test, just to hold you responsible. Their EULAs are all English, but the vocabulary allows for so many inferences that no human brain can master the possibilities. Usually there is one arcane provision in there that means you have to send Microsoft 5.2% of all proceeds and profits from anything you earn from an application developed using Microsoft Development Tools!"

"Prove it," Travis shot back.

"OK, suppose I decide to list all possible alphabets from the ordinary English one we use. I'd start off with a to z, just like normal. Then I'd have to list all the A-a to z combos. Then the B-a to z combos and so on. Then I'd list all the a to z-A combos and all the a to z-B combos, etc. When I finally got to the end, using ANY system of patterns, no matter how far out I extend it, IF I come to a stopping place, THEN I can list the very last list out again, and add an 'a,' at the end, and it's a whole new alphabet list. The exhaustive list of all broken patterns is incomplete, and a German named Goedel (Girdle Travis, not Go-Dell, like YOU always say,) mathematically said 'Give it up, you ain't gonna list 'em all,' in a theorem called 'The Incompleteness Theorem.'" He mentally reviewed his monologue and decided it was sufficient and smiled at Travis to communicate he was done.

Undaunted, Travis finished his current mouthful and inquired, "...and this proves...?"

"Why Travis, did Teal beat ya over the head with an AGGIE? It PROVES you can't infer EVERYTHING there is to know about a Microsoft EULA ever. In ONE READING, you can infer things that are important to ya from a single context, but ya have to review at least once before every paying program application, or the IRS will come after ya for unreported income to Microsoft. It's a legal bind!" He turned his attention to a soggy cone, yielding to unattended drippings from the contents.

Travis was not convinced that Bubba believed everything he said, and decided to rib his fellow 5t accordingly. "Your point?" he asked pointedly.

As Travis changed subjects from Burger to Fries, Bubba contemplated beating him over the head with an Aggie. Then inspiration struck. Travis had missed a trick, and he was going to be the victor in the confrontation. "Travis, you are not burdened with an understanding intellect! YOU install a program and you just ignore the thing IF it doesn't inconvenience you. Why, I've even seen you run a cracker 13 times, just to gen up a valid Microdollar code to install a Microdollar Ap. My POINT was that IF the Open Source people want to specify anything NOVEL, they are gonna have a list of GPG EULAs so long it'll boggle the mind!"

"All they have to do is put GPG2, and then add '...excepting on Thursdays from 3-4 AM!'" Travis disagreed blithely.

Bubba gave Travis a searching looking over that would have made a puppy look humorous, just as if his head turned on a pivot. Maybe he WAS that ignorant. He wasn't stupid, or things he said would be stupider, and he wasn't an idiot... Bubba himself had seen him learn from a mistake. "You need to write you Kansas City cousin Mo, and show it to him!" he compromised. "Mo isn't dumb."

Travis was diverted and missed the implication before he spoke. "Not dumb, but more stubborn than an Aggie mule!" he exclaimed. He paused as comprehension flooded through his brain. "I can see our team missed THAT two-points. I was trying to avoid a three-second violation," he sheepishly apologized.

Bubba could now afford to be magnanimous. "It wasn't exactly a slam dunk," he agreed. "On balance, it's a new shot clock."

"When I can't pass, I shoot," Travis affirmed.

"When I can't shoot, I pass," Bubba responded, and bussed the table. "Later?"

"U2," Travis answered in parting. The Kawasaki buzzed like a mosquito, and Bubba contemplated suggesting Glasspaks. No... it was better to leave it deceptively powerful, like his computer and his mouth.