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Microsoft

Open Sourcing Windows Based Project 256

Posted by Cliff from the windows-needs-open-source-too! dept.
metasynth asks: "The company I work for has developed a timer system in Delphi for Windows machines. I'm currently trying to convince my boss to open source it as the program is to be used to help develop a community around it. I'm looking for good arguments to open source the system, and details (or links to details) of how to go about it. What type of license should we use to allow us to keep reasonable control over the project, e.g. a license where anyone can download and work on the code and distribute it as much as they want, but have them send us back the modifications that they have done for us to decide whether or not to include them in the offical release. One other question is: What sort of interest is there in the Slashdot comunity for a windows based open source project?"
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Open Sourcing Windows Based Project More

Open Sourcing Windows Based Project

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  • Hmm...open source with windows..
    Well you could tell your boss that it would be like having a LOT of experienced programmers working for him, but without having to pay them!
  • Chances are, if you do it right, you'll get a lot of free coverage in the media. I don't know too many companies where that doesn't carry some weight. The fact that it would be positive coverage is even better 8^) It will certainly give you a public forum for being responsive to your customers/user group.

  • Just use GPL (Score:2)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Please, just use GPL. You don't lose the software, you gain improvements. There's really nothing in trying to "force" people into sending their enchantments to you; at least nothing warranting using anything but the GPL. GPL has been tested and analyzed so many times it's proven to be pulletproof. You also gain everyone's respect.

  • GPL (Score:1)

    by Tomahawk ( 1343 )
    Sounds to me that you are describing the GPL. Isn't that exactly that Linus does with Linux - other people view the source, make changes, send it back to Linus, and then he decides whether it will be in the kernel or not.

    Looks like GPL is your only man. And we like it too, which is all the better :)

    T.
  • One other question is: What sort of interest is there in the slashdot comunity for a windows based open source project?"

    Please, not flames. I think this would be a great idea, not just for the /. community but for the open source movement overall. There is the obvious us and them mentality from both the M$ contingent and the open source community. Open Source folks preach this is the way to go and the M$ community cries we can't be profitable with GPL. This could be a great oppurtunity to prove that open source relating to the M$ and Windows environments can/is profitable if done correctly.

  • Not open-sourcing windows, an open source project for the win32 platform instead of *nix.
  • Don't worry, she'll still have time to change your diapers.
  • personally I would love to see windows as a whole be open source ;)

    As per a program being open sourced for the windows environment I am sure it would help begin the process towards it becomming more common, as more examples of programs becomming open sourced more and more will tend to follow that path (if my fore sight is working correctly this morning)

    Did not Netscape become open sourced?
    as well as Doom?
    or was that Quake 1?

    Every program I write for windows is open source.

    IMHO close source software is for greedy igmo's and if more demand is made for it I am sure it will be a big step in a good direction for that hacker in all of us who wants to learn things the easy way and not have to reverse engineer something...

    Don't you all think that?

  • Netscape Public License (Score:4)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday March 03, 2000 @04:26AM (#1228876)

    These are the exact terms used in the Netscape
    licenses.

    Just make sure you continue to lead the
    development. Learn from the early lessons that
    the Mozilla project teaches us - don't expect a
    public license to mean that a ton of developers
    will magically develop things - there needs to be
    a leader who does a majority of the code (exactly
    how Linux was in the early days).

    Mark

  • License Suggestions (Score:3)

    by karb ( 66692 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @04:26AM (#1228877)
    I think the artistic license has some provisions for "keeping control" of your project. However, the artistic license has some holes in it that were explained to me once but I now forget them. I won't start a license flame war, but I will suggest the GPL.

    The fact of the matter is, however, that if you are the primary contributor to the project, and/or are in the position of the "maintainer," you should have no problems with the project pretty much following your intended direction. If there is enough dissension among your contributors, there is always the possibility a fork will form, but nothing anybody can do can remove anything from your project.

    As for making sure that modifications are propagated back to you: This isn't possible under the GPL (which is what you want to use), and isn't really enforceable even if a license did provide for it. However, if you are the maintainer/principal contributor, people will be pretty likely to try to get their code included in the release, and if you use the GPL they will have to use it, and so, for example, they couldn't (legally) distribute their own binary without source.

    One more thing : you would have to be responsible (unless you copyright the code to the FSF) for prosecuting anybody who violated the license. I don't think it happens often, but it is something to keep in mind.

  • Given all the qualms that various people have with the GPL...and given the fact that many people seem to have one open source license they like above all others...

    Here's an interesting project for someone with a little bit of time:
    Make a website listing, detailing, and comparing all the current open source licenses that are being used. Set-up a nice clean web-site which is devoted to the different open source licenses that people have written up, perhaps with some sort of arguments for and against each one? Try to make it relatively impartial. Perhaps even try to get some of the OpenLaw [harvard.edu] people to contribute some time to analyze them in relation to various legal structures around the planet.

    Heck, here's even a starter just off the top of my head and Yahoo:

    I looked around a bit, but can't seem to find any site that really does this already cleanly and clearly. Any takers?

  • You couldn't use the GPL, because your project would involve some part of the VCL most likely (TForm comes to mind), and that's copyrighted. What's worse, is if your project relies on using a unit that's only distributed with different versions of Delphi. Math.dcu and the NT Service wizard come to mind. Consider any other copyrighted units you might be using that you can't distribute.

    You could try the Artistic license, or XFree86, or hang it all out and go BSD, which would likely have no problems with the VCL copyrights, or any other component copyrights for that matter, but then you lose any possibility of control.
  • Is the GPL actually proven? I don't believe it has been tested in a court yet. Wasn't there an article about our friend John Carmak in Id software thinking about bringing someone to court over the GPL?

    Chances are the GPL will be proven once (if?) that happens, but until then you can't really say, from a legal perspective, that it is proven. The GPL is an excellent license, however, and recommended for use. The fact that it is used on so many projects indicates that a lot of people trust it, and believe that, should it ever have it's time in court, it will win. I personally believe that it would.

    From an open-source project point of view, then yes, GPL has been proven to work successfully.

    T.

  • SCSL (Score:2)

    by howardjp ( 5458 )
    Based on the terms you describe, the something similar to Sun's Community Source License maybe what you are looking for. It is the only license I know of that will allow you to force that modifications be returned to you. Neither the BSDL or the GPL will do this.

    However, if it is not that important that the code be returned, please use the least restrictive license possible, something like the BSDL or the X Windows License.
  • There was a whole chapter in the book "open sources" that did just that.

    I have no idea where you could find an online copy of that article (although I'm sure it exists)... I wish I had my copy here. doh.

  • no cvs, no patch, etc (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    unfortunely, Delphi is crap when it come to concurrent developments on internet or patch sharing.

    you don't have cvs, no patch, no diff, etc

    I've tryed with my components, but is a pain in the ass everytime to incorporate changes of others, because there is no simple mechanism found in delphi.
  • Mac developers face many of the same issues. Similar suggestions appreciated.
  • What kind of project are you working on? You say it's a timer system but that doesn't ring any bells for me. The best would be if it is something extensible. If users can add "mods" or "skins" to add functionality or merge it with other programms it would be ideal. You could tell your boss about the wide user base you would get by allowing others to expand your work. People tend to stick to software if there own code is in it.

    Shop around at Netscape and Sun for a license.

  • You asked what sort of license to use on Slashdot? You must be a glutton for punishment...

    It looks to me like the GPL will do what you need it to. There's nothing that forces anyone to send modifications back to you, but people do have to make source available for any modified versions they distribute. Most people will voluntarily send changes back to you, anyway. (But how do you diff a some of the file types Delphi uses?) You might also want to consider the LGPL if this is just a Delphi component. I suspect GPLed components would still scare away a lot of businesses. <sigh>

    Regardless of the license you pick, please, please try to use an already established one. At the very least, it allows people to have a general understanding of what they can do with your software without having to read Yet Another (Free)|(Open Source) License. You also get the benefit of code sharing with a greater number of projects (not that this is a huge pool for Delphi programs right now). Most free licenses are only really compatible with themselves (the notable exception being BSD-style licensing, but that allows people to make proprietary derivatives of your work, which it doesn't sound like you want).


    --Phil (Challenge: let's see if we can have a license discussion without flaming.)
  • Make a website listing, detailing, and comparing all the current open source licenses that are being used.
    There is a pretty good list at opensource.org [opensource.org], but it regrettably lacks any commentary or comparisons.
  • a licence where anyone can download and work on the code and distribute it as much as they want, but have them send us back the modifications that they have done for us to decide whether or not to include them in the offical release.

    I don't think it's in your best interest to try to force this with a license clause. In other words, don't try to force people to send you their modifications or not distribute them on their own.

    For one thing, most people will do what you want anyway. Maintaining software can be a lot of work, and, if I have a modification I make to some code, it's a lot simpler and easier for me to just send it to you for inclusion than to maintain it myself or to start a parallel distribution. It just doesn't make sense to do that.

    So, since it doesn't make sense for me to not do what you want, you don't have to legally mandate it in a license. Mandating that patches be sent to you would make your code non-free, using the open source definition, so, that would put off a lot of potential developers.

    The GPL would probably serve you well and probably much better than anything you could cook up yourself.

  • Re:Gateswatch [Offtopic] (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Well, Red Hat recently announced that they sold 12 copies of Red Hat Linux 6.1, "significantly" more than expected. 12 * $40 = $480. Also, passerbys saw Red Hat president Bob Young standing in the street and gave him $5.32, thinking he was a bum. That's $485.32! What's hard to justify about that?
  • do you have a link? I remember the project, but not where the website is..

  • The "slashdot community" is a myth (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I wouldn't call a bunch of rabid zealots a community. It would be equally absurd to talk about a "ZDnet community" or a "MacSurfer community". This is a commercial site that attracts many casual readers with different backgrounds and interests. The term "community" is a gross misnomer.
  • You're right; I'm getting sick and tired of the us and them mentality. I think too much effort & energy is wasted on the endless discussions about who is better. By now we all know the UXen are better ;), but still leaves a lot to be desired. I think all this energy could by used in a more positive way (in both camps that is!!)
  • I'm also writing windows software that I'm debating whether or not to go GPL with. The reason I restrain is that my source code might be worth a lot of money someday. If I GPL it then people can get it free. Isn't there a lot of profit lost in open sourcing?
  • The stereotypical Windows users don't seem to trust anything that they're given for free. I think Perl had this problem. Nobody was interested unless they had to pay for it.

    The only solution is to releaase it at a very high price with the source code, but release it under an open source licence. Also allow free downloads. (Strangley enough, most open source licences don't stop you from doing this).

  • What sort of interest is there in the slashdot comunity for a windows based open source project?"
    I think the interest will be proportional first to the functionalities you plan to develop, and second to their portability.

    There's no reason why an open source project developed for Windows wouldn't interest people interested in Open Source -- plenty of people have to deal with Windows. For myself, augmenting Windows with as much GNU software as possible makes me happy.

    That is, if you're doing something useful, that doesn't already exist in open source, people will be interested. If in addition it does not tie you excessively to the platform (say for example, a pretty-printer for the DOS "DIR" command probably wouldn't interest anyone who didn't use Windows), than you would of course broaden that interest considerably, even if you don't even worry about portability at this point.
  • just finished Raymond's 'The Catherdral & the Bazaar' The Magic Cauldron essay in particular makes a very good rational / conventional economics value case for Open Source in many cases, & sensibly discusses when it does & does not make sense -
  • No, you do not give up your rights with the GPL. You force everyone else to. This is not unlike the UCITA (did I get the letters in the right order?).
  • if it is open source..
    I don't think a person could really be forced to pay for it.. like linux, i can download it or pay for it...
    and if I write a program I am not copywriting a a command or a tool... I am copywriting a interpretation.. same information displayed differently..
    which is what allows many books to be written on one topic, same info presented differently.

    am i right or am I wrong?

    i did not research for this opinion I pulled it out of my head. (or arse[depends on view you hold])
  • From my observation, open-source works best for software in maintainence mode; other programmers introduce feature changes and/or bug fixes while maintainer decides what to incorporate and what to reject. For initial development it is usually inappropriate, you may have deadlines to met but others don't, and they don't get paid for it. case in point, linux, perl, emacs.

    The timer system may be a good candidate especially if it is a utility library, i.e. it is something you base your work on but it is not the final product your company makes money on. LGPL/BSD will be appropriate here.

    If you want to get started, look in Delphi for Linux and see if the code is portable to the Windows environment. The reason is, open-source software usually needs a foothold in an open-source platform; open-source community within a closed-source platform users are smaller. Hence, developing open-source software mainly for a closed-source platform is a real challenge. Case in point, netscape. Focus on main development on open-source platform, and adapt the changes to the closed-source port (which you may have to pay for).

    My unchargable 2 cents worth.

    Hasdi

  • No Delphi was/is a development IDE from what used to be known as Borland Software (now Inprise). It was there answer to M$ Visual Basic IDE and actually quite good. I'm in favor of having and executable rather that some VB run time code.

    It is based on Object Pascal.
  • Actually, I'm hideously wrong.

    I read some other posts, and was reminded that the NPL and MPL kind of give first priority to the copyright holder. Somebody mentioned the SCSL, although I don't know much about that.

    Also, they're probably more suit friendly than the GPL.

    Sorry for the innaccuracy.

  • I prefer running freeware or open source on 'doze - the quality is much better, period. Check out the O-reilly book, as suggested, Brian Behlendorf's essay will give you some pointers on how to get it off the ground, and business cases for your boss. Try to consider your infrastructure first - CVS, web site, mailing lists and make sure you back it up with *actual code* when released. There are plenty of open source wannabees out there who have no code base that's worth a crap.
  • It's early for me, but if you are trying to judge the favor for a windows-based OSS project, you don't have to look much farther than the Borg Icon that this story got! Hmm Rob may have to get a windows logo for announcements like this. It would start to confuse people if OSS annoucements for Win start appearing more.

  • Re:Could be great (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I must agree with you, windows apps opensourced make a lot of sense. Even thought it is probable that I will not use them. I am also very "fan" with the other way arround, the port of *nix apps into the windows world (like gimp and apache, for instance).

    Now about GPLing a delphi project would this be even possible? (I am realy asking this because I don't know) I mean a delphi project depends on closed/propietary source to even compile. And to even start to work on this you will have to buy a product (delphi). Is it realy possible to GPL a delphi project???

  • UCITA (Score:3)

    by panda ( 10044 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @04:50AM (#1228925) Homepage Journal
    The GPL is actually a license (i.e. granting you additional rights to the ones that you already have) as opposed to most other "licenses" which are really restrictions on rights you have. Most jurisdictions allow someone to grant you additional rights without requiring your permission, but you must explicitly agree (i.e. sign something) to give up rights. Therefore, "shrink wrap licenses" are not enforceable in most jurisdictions.

    Here's where UCITA comes in. Everyone knows that it's evil because it will put teeth in those "shrink wrap licenses." To those of us who do not use shrink wrap software, this is no big deal. The flip side is that it would give razor-sharp piranha teeth to the GPL, and if you could actually prove that someone was distributing software in violation of the GPL (i.e. I take GNU Emacs, hack it a little bit, and sell it without releasing source code), then they can be not only sued, but also charged with a crime! Chances are if you can prove they did, they'll be convicted or found liable for damages.

    If you think about it, UCITA is our friend. It could have the effect of driving people away from the ridiculous and uncertain "licenses" of shrink wrap, commercial software providers towards Open Source, GPL software.

    So, that's my new mantra: "UCITA is your friend."
  • As a Windows programmer (primarily in Visual FoxPro) I want to add that not only is Open Source not incompatible with Windows development, but may be where its next big expansion will occur.

    In case you guys hadn't noticed, what goes on in the Unix/Linux world escapes the attention of most of the M$ based developers. This isn't coincidence! They are largely isolated, well in the sphere of influence of Redmond and readily believe such nonsense as M$ created symbolic links.

    A large part of why Open Source hasn't reached them yet, is they don't know anymore about it than what they hear on TV.

    By supporting Open Source on the Windows platform, we can take this movement, which surpercedes ANY platform, or environment, and hit the corporate code mongers right in their backyard.

    Don't overlook your compatriots that are inside enemy lines :) Some of us are working hard to get Open Source projects--and Open Source products--into the midst of our often backward thinking, and behind the times M$ peers.

    Look for more and more Open Source main stream efforts in the Windows environment, they are coming.
  • Yes, sure someone will write the code themselves if it's a simple timer, but if you work for a company that makes it's living on a very complex product, then why on earth would you want to give away your:

    a) trade secrets to your competitors (free as in speech)
    b) only source of income (free as in beer)

    I find it a bit odd that the original poster wants to open source something, but is asking us for reasons WHY to do it. If he doesn't know, then why does he want to open source it in the first place? Mass hysteria?

    Personally I think GPL is cool, but it's definitely not suitable for ALL cases, companies and/or projects.

    Calling software companies greedy just because they charge for their products and keep the source closed is like calling Coca Cola greedy because they don't give away their secret formula.

    Not all companies want to change their business model into tech support and packaging.
  • If I amworking with GPL project X which you created, I do not have the right to license my changes in anyway I please. I must use the GPL. In this way, I have no right to decide under what terms people will use my code, even if mycode is not the whole product. You are forcing your license and opinion about how my code should be licensed on me.
  • > No, you do not give up your rights with the GPL. You force everyone else to.

    Not true. With GPL, you CAN NOT DENY people's right to copy it, in contra distinction to a typical commercial license in that users NEVER had the right to copy it in the first place (unless for archival purposes.)

  • To a certain extent.

    Part of a distributed development process is distributed designing and distributed control. The more control you give up to the other developers you're courting, the more likely you are to gain more developers. Visibility is also important, of course, but people want to work on a project where they know they aren't just doing some corporation's work for free. So opensourcing the project means gaining momentum, noteriety, and more features in exchange of less control and giving up some intellectual property.

    The more free your code is, the more free other people will be with their code in response.

  • I think you're wandering a bit left of center here.

    You can't *legally* download delphi.

    Copyright infringement could potentially damage the reputation of both the lead maintainer, and anyone else involve (not to mention legal suits if copyrighted units are distributed).

    Now, if you were to write the whole thing from scratch (no vcl, no pre-manufactured units), you'd A) be wasting lots of time and B) be fully legal to distribute under anything you wanted.
  • I do not pay for any software.
    whether or not I am *suppose* to or not.

    GPL is not synonymous with crappy code

    winblows blows goats and It is not GPL
    there is more code out there you pay for that sucks

    granted there is also good software that is payware

    and lots of good stuff that is freeware

    and bad stuff that is freeware.

    works both ways.

    you think windows is at a reasonable price? (or any microsoft product for that matter?) they may make alot in ales of the initial product, but LOTS of people make millions in tech support for there crappy code.

    stop being biased and open your mind.
    on second thought keep it closed your evil thoughts might be contagious.
  • Don't know about that. Look at some of the other big boys in the sandbox who are looking favorable on the GPL model, IBM, SUN etc. The worlds changing pretty quickly and if companies don't change with it, they die. Knowing M$ is not nearly near death, it could happen and could happen quickly, look at some who didn't change. . . DEC, WANG, Macy's, Dodge, Zewnith, the list goes on and on.

  • Delphi Open Source Initiative (Score:4)

    by dccase ( 56453 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @04:56AM (#1228938)
    Here's a site for Open Source Delphi projects:

    http://delphree.clexpert.com/pages/default.htm [clexpert.com]

  • blah blah blah.

    The GPL is all about user's rights. Users can copy software, users get source to software, users can redistribute software.

    Normal software is all about original developer rights. They can license it, they can declaim warranty, and they can charge you for upgrades.

    Other licenses vary (Sun's license is closer to the latter). BSD is all about all developer's rights. You can redistribute, you can extend in proprietary or nonproprietary fashion. You just have to give credit where credit is due (original developers). This last clause has been relaxed (not revoked) recently.

  • One thing I forgot to mention in my post about UCITA above is that the GPL is enforceable (in the U.S. at least) under current law. Because the GPL grants you additional rights than those you are allowed under Copyright, you may bring copyright infringement charges against anyone who attempts to assert those additional rights without following the conditions as outlined in the license. There's no signature required for this, because if you refuse to abide by the GPL, then you are bound by copyright law, which in the United States, does not grant you the right to redistribute the code in any form.

    Of course, the standard disclaimer about the above not constituting legal advice applies. If you're in legal trouble or contemplating doing something that requires legal assistance, don't ask for advice here, hire a lawyer.
  • Here are arguments against it (although I'd love it):
    1) No freeware/universal compiler, we all know that Borland C++ is different from Visual C++ and from Turbo C++ for Windows, (in your case, Turbo Pascal and Delphi). And they cost big bucks and big hard drive.
    2) Not many people care about the source, they just want it so they can compile it. Compiling the source cuts any library inconsistancies, other than that I don't care what you do with it.
    3) The windows community is different, they are more into downloading shareware and cracking it. Seriously, I can find plenty of VMWare cracks for NT, but not Linux. :)

    If you do go open source, good for you.
    Roy Miller
    :wq! DOH!
  • > But how do you diff some of the file types Delphi uses?

    With Delphi 5, almost all the files that delphi uses are text and thus easily diff'able.
    In delphi 1-4 the form layouts (.dfm files) were stored as binary. Delphi 5 now makes these text by default.

    If you have project which started off in Delphi 1..4, and is now in Delphi 5, and you still have binary dfms, I would seriously recomend using the conversion utility to change them over. The process is painless and relatively quick.

    Now if only we could convince MS SourceSafe that what was once a binary file is now a text file, then it would show us the diffs.

  • Re:Could be great (Score:5)

    by Masem ( 1171 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @05:00AM (#1228946)
    While I agree that OpenSource will hit Windows next, there is a LARGE obsticle there, and it's surprisingly not due to Microsoft.

    With almost all unix systems, you have "cc" or some varient, and "make" and some varient. Additionally tools, such as automake, etc, help with system dependances, but in general, all you need to do to build an OS program is untar, ./configure, and make all.

    On the Windows side, however, there is no preferred developer enviroment. Yes, you can get Cygwin tools with come with gcc and make and all other unix tools, but I would suspect that less than 1% of Windows programmers know about these. Most are used to visual environments where the concept of a makefile is not well know. Thus, if I was to do an OS Windows project, I'd need to supply a project file for all the major IDEs (a task in and of itself). Then I have to worry about all the slight differences in how the compilers work; something may compile out of the box fine on Borland C++, but fails miserably under Microsoft Visual C++. The solution in most of these cases is not quite as simple as having #ifdef _UNIX_ in the source; there are probably major revamps to the code to make sure it works. And I haven't even mentioned propriatary extentions to the languages yet by each vendor.

    With that said, if you do approach an OS project, make sure that you stick to ANSI and Win32 APIs calls as close as possible, and avoid using compiler features. Try to follow how UNIX code is set up; maybe, just maybe, someone might want to port your app from Win32 to Unix, so keep GUI and engine functionality separate. Try to know the various differences between the IDEs avaiable. I believe you can also compile Win32 code using the Cygwin gcc compilers, so this might be a good test of how portable your final code is for open source distribution.

  • Interest (Score:2)

    by slim ( 1652 )
    Speaking personally, and probably for a lot of other people, I can't get excited about a project which is /only/ for Windows.

    There's nothing wrong with open source code for Windows, but it would be better if your work was cross-platform, or at the very least easy to port after-the-fact.

    Note that most of the GNU projects are available for Windows, as are things like Samba, Perl, etc.

    A Delphi module though? Good luck.

    A lot of the benefits (to the author) of releasing code open source is somewhat proportional to the size of the community that uses it (and therefore eyeballs the code). If the userbase is small, you're unlikely to reap the benefits.

    Sorry to be so negative. Release it anyway, just because it makes you feel good :)
    --
  • Opening the source of a project can only be a good idea (yes,Windows is included :) ). Opening the source of a project destined to a mainly closed-source market is even better.
    However, there are other interesting consequences to add :
    Later this year, Borland is supposed to release both Delphi and C++Builder for Linux. I salute this, since I consider their tools the best I've ever seen. Releasing now the sources of a Windows project written in Delphi will be the first step in filling a gap beteween Windows and Linux programmers. Think about it : if there are similar libraries (i.e. VCL) couldn't this mean that Linux will gain thousands of programmers over night ? Furthermore, the actual Linux programmers will find easier to learn a new (and funny) way of doing a part of their job
    Again, an open source program also means reliability (and sometimes the old-fashioned trustworthness). Wouldn't this be a benefit for the Windows world ? After all, I really would like to see some fair and honest competition between operating systems and that could start from here. Because, just as many others I am not against Windows per se, but against the way it's promoted, the way M$ tries to bury everything else - in a few words : against Billy

    As far as licence is concerned : GPL would be great but I know how the average manager think, so I wouldn't go that far and recommend this. you could even create your own open-source license, or adopt one of the existing. Really, I think this hase to be your choice.
  • Open source is hype, but has a certain history. Open Source is a community, not a product.

    Choosing a good license model is important. According to this article [osopinion.com] you can make decisions on this, which won't be appreciated. Choose a license, and be clear what you want with open source.

    You want complete control? Do you want control like Linus Thorvalds has? Do you want control like Sun has?

    What do you want to give to the community? What do you expect to get back (i.e. customers?

    Is it a project with a couple of sequal projects (like MS-Office can be seen as a sequal for Windows, Windows is step 1, Office is step 2)

    I think you can only think of arguments for or against the choice of going open source when it is fully clear what you want, and what you don't want.

  • Open Source has nothing to do with the platform. There are plenty of Windows programs that have the source code available, but they tend to be low-key things like lcc and such, and not the big moneymakers behind Windows' popularity (Word, Quicken, Delphi, most games). Then again, Linux doesn't have programs that that fit into that class at the moment.
  • Any license would do. Start with the GPL. You can always change the license for the code that you've written in a later version, if there is a later version. You still own that code.

    Contributions from other people will become problematic if you decide to change the license. So you may not want to change the license after all.

    --
    IIO
  • liar liar pants on fire, hanging from a telephone wire...

  • See http://www.delphi-jedi.org/

    The Joint Endevour of Delphi Inovators (in thier own way they see themseles as fighting the evil empire) is an umbrella organisation of various open-source Delphi code library projects (starting with windows API headers).

    They favour the mozilla public licence http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/annotated.html

    If you use this licence, your code would be easily compatible with thiers.

  • Just a clarification: It may be difficult to *require* that improvements be sent back to you, but most open source licences are designed to ensure that you can have source access to derivative works.

    As to the hows, whys, dos & don'ts: Read ESR's stuff

    http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writ ings/cathedral-bazaar/ [tuxedo.org]

    Jeff

  • http://ceps.sourceforge.net/index.shtml
  • So, since it doesn't make sense for me to not do what you want, you don't have to legally mandate it in a license.

    Mightn't it be smart to mandate that modifications ARE sent back IF the updates are to be used in a commercial (vs. private or custom) distribution? Or would such a situation be impossible under the conventional terms of the GPL?

  • THIS is insightful?
    A suggestion to make a business application skinnable?
    OMG.
    That's just pathetic. Is that what the GPL is about? Making stuff cool?

    Sheesh.
    Also, his companies application 'doesn't ring a bell' with you?
    Are you his project manager? Are you the US Patent office? Are you SUPPOSED to be aware of all applications developed in/for the Windows OS?
    To whom at your mountain kingdom do we submit our work?

    Your arrogance is astounding.

    "Don't try to confuse the issue with half truths and gorilla dust."
    Bill McNeal (Phil Hartman)
  • I think the artistic license has some provisions for "keeping control" of your project. However, the artistic license has some holes in it that were explained to me once but I now forget them.

    No, no, no, es la licencia poética.

    --

    Soy el cobarde anónimo. Phear mis l33t haxor facultades!

  • Or, forget tearing your hair out with incompatibilities. And just write in pure Java. It's simple really!

    Of course, then you just have to tell people not to use the Microsoft JVM and compiler because it's incompatible (RMI not properly supported, compiler/VM bugs mean JAXP won't run, etc. etc.) - but that's not hard to comply with, because the JDK is a free download.

    Probability of getting flamed for this post by clueless Java-haters: 0.9

  • Please, this is not flame, just a statement of facts.

    I don't know if I'm representative of the Slashdot community, but my view of Windows is something like this: a) I will never put critical/production software on Windows; b) I profoundly dislike Windows both as a working and as a development platform - I went through great pains to tailor myself a job where I almost never need to do anything in Windows and c) I will never touch Windows unless absolutely necessary for customer to buy my products, and then never as a server - I'd rather not have a customer using Windows as a server because I know I'll spend a lot of time working around Windows to get it to work properly with my Linux-based products, plus I won't get paid to do that, plus I can't expect any help from the MSP who maintains the Windows box.

    That put, I have to say any new aditions to the open source base is welcome, but you'll probably have to spend some time/money on convincing Windows users to use anything open source seriously because they're the guys who'll use it if anyone will and they don't trust open source.

  • Haven't Borland just released thier C++ Compiler as open source?

  • Depends on your goals... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Most GPL'd software originated as a project that
    someone wrote for their own needs. The original
    programmer isn't in marketing, and isn't
    interested in building "production" quality code
    and going through all of the effort it takes to
    sell software. Plus it is a big risk.

    If you want to make millions, you will need to
    handle marketing, distribution, and support. You
    will need to give kickbacks to distributors, and
    buy advertising from magazines, and do all of the
    things that most programmers hate.

    If you release some cool free software, and you're
    lucky, you'll build a large community and end up
    with users who will hire you to do things that
    they need.

    Mark
  • hmm

    well ok

    if I write a program in vis basic (prolly a horrid example but I am a programmer in training) and gave it away for free.. I would also have to distribute say vbrun5.dll with it or the program is worthless...

    though I am not charging for vbrun.dll I do not think I would be infringing on any copyright's

    If however I was selling the program, and distributing vbrun.dll along with it i would think that is closer to copyright infringment.

    it may ease your mind to know that I have abso-friggin-lutely no idea what delphi is.

    but if something is free I dont see how it can be copyright infringed.. especially if i am not making a profit.

    please sir, show me the light so that I may correct the error of my ways
  • Have you looked at Opensource.org [opensource.org]?

    There are a lot of good documents that could anser your questions, e. g. the business case [opensource.org] which gives you arguments for convincing your boss. There is also a list of licenses [opensource.org], although it doesn't compare them. I think many people here at /. would recommend the GPL.

    By doing a Google search [google.com] for open source licenses [google.com], I also found this [stromian.com], but there is probably more out in the net.

    Many open source projects work like you describe your wishes, including the Linux kernel [kernel.org] itself. Linux is under the GPL [opensource.org].

    And for your last question: although I don't use Windoze and other micros~1 products, I would really be happy if there were an increasing number of Win open source projects! I think this way more people would get aware of the open source philosophy and then perhaps would consider doing there own software development as open source. And perhaps we would see less proprietary or shareware (yuck) software.

    - Stephan.
    --
    Carpe diem!
  • Some of us wouldn't recognise irony even if it came in a large, red, blinking font saying "THIS IS IRONIC!", now would we?
  • Only if it's cool enough to make people want to develop for it. How many open source projects have died out because no one wanted to work on them?
  • Actually, I just checked the GPL to make sure. Derivative works *are* required to be GPL licensed.

    However, there are no provisions (that I could find) as to the original author getting to see the source again. It is just that future distributions must be licensed under the GPL, which may or may not result in the original author getting to see the code.

    Please let me know if I missed something :)

  • Perhaps you'd want to contact the maintainers of this project for a perspective on your own: Michael Haller wrote a Win32 MUA called Phoenix Mail with Delphi 3. The project has been moving by fits and starts, but has actually been moving. Currently the project is doomed because of internal squabbling and the project lead is looking for someone to take over the project. The MUA is actually pretty decent and with the right team behind it, it could be one of the better mail clients around. Go take a look at the Phoenix Mail Development Group [highq.com]. If you are interested in taking over the project go have a look at their mailing list [egroups.com], it's like a messy scene in a sci-fi movie where the rescuers find the colonists dead having killed each other with their bare hands.
  • The flip side is that it would give razor-sharp piranha teeth to the GPL, and if you could actually prove that someone was distributing software in violation of the GPL (i.e. I take GNU Emacs, hack it a little bit, and sell it without releasing source code), then they can be not only sued, but also charged with a crime! Chances are if you can prove they did, they'll be convicted or found liable for damages.

    I have no legal experience, but I have a real concern about this. I don't know if UCITA provides for criminal penalties, but I think there may be problems with a civil case. How to you show there were damages when the software is free. What amount of money did they cost you not releasing their source. You gave away the code, and even gave them permission to modify and redistribute the application. I understand that the GPL requires that they provide the source, but is it likely that they'll ever have to pay any damages. I can see the courts stoping them from distributing the software, but without finicial penalties, I don't think the "teeth" are very sharp.

    Since I really don't know much about this it would be nice if someone with a little more legal background could clarify this.
  • I hope you don't walk around saying "ootopia" on a regular basis.
  • VB Does executables... it has since verison 5.0.

    Not that I'm saying VB is great, it's a sub-average tool that I've been forced to use _ALOT_!
  • You need to give a company a very good reason to open source anything.
    Far to many see open sourcing as "giving it away" and in short it is...
    They see binary only as a way to control the program (this is a flawed idea.. any cracker can decompile binarys and examin the results for flaws.. or any coder could do same and see how it was done)

    They also give up the right to slap down anyone who trys to distribute the source and/or binarys.. All they can do is go after anyone who distributes binarys and no source.

    There are a lot of neat market modles that work well but thats asking a bit of a radical change. Let it stay as long as they feel they can compeate the old way... and right now open sourcing dose not automaticly open up any markets.

    Question: Dose the code to be openned enhance/premote an existing product by the same company...
    If this is the case then openning the source just makes it better and better. The company still has a closed source product and everyone is happy

    Question: Is there a proffit made from the product?

    If a company is losing money on a product they can chouse to fight it out and hope for the best or they can open source the product and get some publicity for other products.

    Question: Is the program free anyway...

    Premotional closed source isn't nearly as effective as premotional open source...
    It dose mean you'll never terminate the premotional piriod but it also means no one can terminate the premotion.
    Even better.. if a compeditor makes a commertal copy (eyeball and rewrite) of your premotional code.. normally you'll just get pushed into obscurity while the comeditor rakes it in... with open source everyone supports you for being the inovator and you get even more premotion as the guys who did it first and "did it better" (even if you didn't.... open source bies is THICK some times.. thats a good thing BTW.. it needs to be.. open source as a premotional tool needs to be better than TV ads.. and right now it's better than that big football event thingy.. the supper somthing... the super troll???)

    Basicly anything you "Give away" has your name attached and as a result is premotional...

    So what if they can not benifit from open source (in a way that is easy to understand)
    You could try anyway :) There are many arguments for open sourcing however unless there are some clearly visable benifits (visable by the boss not by you) you are facing an uphill battle.. but if your up to it... fight on :)

    You can allways go for liccensed source...
    This is something that has been around for a very long time... You ask that they sign a simi-restrictive non-disclosure.
    I stress simi-restrictive.... You WANT your custummers to distribute upgrades and patches...
    As well as just document tricks and tecniques...
    and the occasional bugfix is allways a good thing... :)
  • With almost all unix systems, you have "cc" or some varient, and "make" and some varient. Additionally tools, such as automake, etc, help with system dependances, but in general, all you need to do to build an OS program is untar, ./configure, and make all.

    I might be completely mislead here, but didn't Cygnus implement a nice package of all those pretty utilities (and even bash) for Windows?

    If so, it sure is a start!
  • OKAY! I'm stupid.. that was already mentioned.

    Please don't moderate me down, I repent!
  • The reason I restrain is that my source code might be worth a lot of money someday. If I GPL it then people can get it free. Isn't there a lot of profit lost in open sourcing?
    Please read the business case [opensource.org] at Opensource.org [opensource.org]!

    There are companies which did exactly this, opening there former proprietary software. Two very well known examples are Mozilla [mozilla.org] and Zope [zope.org]. There is a good description [zope.org] how Digital Creations [digicool.com] went open source with Zope [zope.org] and what their fears were and why they still did it.

    - Stephan.
    --
    Carpe diem!

  • One of the major (IMO) problems for GPL'ed software still exist under this dreamy picture of the UCITA. That is the problem of who's going to do the suing?

    For instance, you put together a neat little GPL'ed widget, and put it out there every one to use. Six months later you get an email from a friend of yours commenting that the latest Windows beta (or to be fair MacOS X DR) has a suspiciously similar widget in it. What are you going to do? Take on the hords of corporate lawyers?

    Even with UCITA to back up your claim, you still have to be able to afford the expense of the lawyers and the time necessary to pursue your claim.

    Besides the UCITA places so many other unfair restrictions on the user as to be unacceptable on it's own anyway. We should not even begin to accept the bad to get the good. Bad Software [badsoftware.com] has the info on why UCITA is a bad idea.

  • Hypothetical situation -- let's say a company has a product that they'd like to open source and allow free non-commercial use, but require payment for commercial use?

    Are there licenses in existence to cover this?

    Anyone wanna start a website that covers things like this? Maybe a segment of one of the already-existing code/source sites?

  • PRF license (Score:3)

    by ZZamboni ( 30487 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @06:31AM (#1229006) Homepage
    Where I study (a research center at Purdue University) most of the research projects for which code is developed are made publicly available at some point. However, as most of them are considered "research prototypes" and not full production systems, they are initially released under a restrictive license (written, at least in my case, by the Purdue Research Foundation), that provides for people to give us back any modifications they make, as well as feedback about their experiences with the system.

    I don't think there is any way of enforcing these terms (on people giving back changes and feedback), but at least it's there in the license. Since we do not profit from these projects (at least not initially), we are interested in the feedback mostly for academic purposes anyway, so enforcement in our case is not much of a concern.

    You can read the license for the AAFID [purdue.edu] project (my main project now) here [purdue.edu].

    --Diego

  • Please moderate the above post up. Very funny!

  • Tcl Extension Architecture (TEA) (Score:3)

    by Col. Klink (retired) ( 11632 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @06:46AM (#1229011)
    At the Tcl/Tk Conference, Brent Welch of Scriptics presented a paper on TEA. From the abstract:

    "The goal of TEA is to create a standard for Tcl extensions that makes it easier to build, install, and share Tcl extensions. In its current form, TEA specifies a standard compilation environment for Tcl and its extensions. The standard uses autoconf, configure and make on UNIX and Windows."

    Specifically, the standard uses Cygwin on Windows. More info is available at: http://dev.scriptics.com/doc/tea/

    One huge advantage to using TEA is that you won't need to recompile your extensions for each new version of Tcl/Tk (as long as you only call the public APIs).
  • I could be wrong, but I don't believe any of these concerns apply to Delphi. Isn't Delphi a proprietary Inprise/Borland language with only one implementation? I could be all wrong here, but if memory serves that is the case... I also seem to remember reading they were considering porting it to linux at some point in the future.

    If I am right then none of these concerns really apply, the source will only be useful to folks with Delphi but there is no worry of multiple versions. The main thing I would think about would be what might you gain/lose by open sourcing it. You gain, at least potentially, more people poking through your code and finding (and fixing) bugs. You lose, well, probably very little, but then again I don't really know your business situation.

    If you have competitors that might gain a significant advantage over you through your release of the code, then I would seriously consider not releasing it. However, if that is not a huge concern, releasing it would probably be a good thing - at least it could be expected to increase the number of eyeballs reviewing it for problems. Don't expect miracles though - the number of open source windows developers is probably pretty small, the number who use Delphi would be a subset, and the number that would be interested in your particular project can only be a subset of that. Now if that linux port ever happens the potential audience should grow quite a bit... so such a release could be viewed as a low risk investment which *might* really pay off later.

    However, there is the fact that if you do release it will be unders a pseudo-open license (ala Netscape or Sun - NOT GPL or BSD.) This means you will be reserving the right to hamstring or kill the code at any point - you aren't allowing forking. Open source developers will tend to work on projects with the sort of license you mention only if they have a strong interest in the functionality and/or (preferably and) the company that controls the code has a good reputation for supporting the community. Even then it may not be enough - in the long run we're better off reimplimenting code from scratch and placing it under a truly open source license than contributing countless hours to building on a half-open project only to see the owner kill it later. So releasing this while you have no immediate expectation of substantial return might help build a little of that sort of reputation for you, which *could* lay the groundwork for substantial returns in the future - but again, no guarantees. I would consider it a longshot.

    If you don't see any way that the release can cause your company substantial harm, I would say go for it. But if the release would expose you to significant risk, I couldn't recommend it - the gain is all potential, with no guarantees.

    (These comments may or may not reflect the posters own opinions after he has another cup of coffee.)
  • IMHO, the Mac has had a lot of strong shareware development, but personally, the hastle of getting the $10 or $20 bucks per install isn't worth the effort of putting in nagware or timeout schemes - i'd rather put my time and effort into building better features than lock users out.

    In my practical experience from being the principal on a MacOS open source project (http://www.webdav.org/goliath [webdav.org]), I decided to use the GPL over other licenses (including LGPL) for the fact that it offers me and my code the best protection. The other side of the balance can include, however, adoption of your project/library. For example, there is only one WebDAV client library for MacOS (mine), and it is open source. Putting that under LGPL would put me and other open source developers at a disadvantage since any commercial software vendor (Apple included) could come down and basically incorporate the code into a commercial product and benefit at the cost of open source initiatives. In other cases (like the GNU GLibC), it may be beneficial to LGPL the source to gain acceptance/ubiquity.

    My biggest challenge has been growing a community around my product, but I've been surprised at the number of places where links to the project have shown up (C-Net [cnet.com] and Apple.com [apple.com] especially). I've also been lucky in that my project is part of a bigger, open standrad and cross platform community (being the associated WebDAV [webdav.org] protocols).

    The thing that would help me the most as a MacOS open source developer would be for Apple to open up their ADC seeding for a minimal cost to qualified open source developers (qualified being that you've at least shipped something and minimal cost being enough to cover CD-ROM pressing/shipping charges and adminstrative expenses). I hope that the development tools derived from the NeXTStep ProjectBuilder and InterfaceBuilder remain free and come with MacOSX; having GCC for mach-o binaries is going to be a boon as well. I love the MetroWerks environment, but for the $500 it costs, gdb/gcc and make work for me.

  • Yes, the Artistic License by itself is probably not a good idea. The GNU people don't reckon [gnu.org] it counts as a free software licence:

    We cannot say that this is a free software license because it is too vague; some passages are too clever for their own good, and their meaning is not clear. We urge you to avoid using it, except as part of the disjunctive license of Perl.

  • GTK and the GIMP were ported to Windows using MSVC++ and later gcc: http://user.sgic.fi/~tml/gimp/win32/ [user.sgic.fi].

  • There are a number of open source projects popping up on the Mac, too...my current fave is "PhatIRC", an IRC client written in RealBasic, with the entire project code and resourced bundled with the distribution under the GPL.

    The problem is, as another poster pointed out, the lack of free software development tools. Mac users like fresh and innovative programing envrionments: they like life easy. RealBASIC and FutureBASIC (Mature and -powerful- OOP IDEs...no comparison to the rip-off Visual Basic) are very popular with beginners and lightweight programmers, and CodeWarrior rocks everyone's world at the top end. But these aren;t -free-...while Apple does give away the Macintosh Programmer's Workbench, MPW isn't easy to learn, implement, or use.

    While someone could concieveably port the GNU tools to the classic MacOS, unless it's as fresh and friendly as RealBasic or Hypercard (now sadly defunct), the mac community isn't going to bite.

    MacOS X has some kewl NeXT dev tools (based on GNU tools, believe it or not), but it's unclear if these is going to be bundled with every copy of X.

    SoupIsGood Food
  • I've been writing GPLed software for the Mac, and there are some real obstacles you have to come to terms with- it'll be very much the same on Windows, so I'll share what it's been like for me, hoping that will bring some light.

    First of all, in many cases you are forced to gloss over some serious problems regarding the freedom of your tools, and rely on making a good-faith effort to be obviously 'open' to the porting of your code to _really_ free languages. I use REALbasic (which is indeed a phenomenal RAD language). A _lot_ of Windows coders use Visual Basic. These are totally closed languages, in the same sense that if you're making Win32 API calls or Mac Toolbox calls they are closed calls. When you're working on a nonfree platform there's almost always _some_ point at which you're forced to interact with just the sort of 'black box' that you're just plain not allowed to use in your own GPLed code.

    At the same time, it's usually possible to make a good faith effort to show that you are writing open code: for instance, the REALbasic 'code' is a single, compact file that makes no effort to be readable outside RB: but there's an option to export all the source as text, so I use that and take pains to offer both forms. This remains a problem, as REALbasic has a sophisticated interface builder, and the information for 'default' controls does _not_ get exported: only if you write actual code into the events of a control does it get exported. So the 'export as source' does not actually produce _all_ the information, it omits window object positioning information. However, there is a new RB third party tool called Project Cuisinart which _can_ produce every last detail in a text format- and so it goes, now that Project Cuisinart (which is not itself open) exists, my notion of 'open source' for REALbasic projects is the Cuisinart view of the total project file, complete with 'pushbutton 1' and a long list of properties- which itself is not open.

    It can be very frustrating and disheartening. Some of the best tools aren't open. In many cases in order for them to be open, even if the tool itself thrived, there would be a team of good people out of work. Which leads me to...

    Hostility. The problem with open source on Windows or Mac is partly that you can expect to be at war with your peers half the time. The best thing you can do is try to help newbies, share information both in the community and as GPLed source, and try to remember 'many enemies, much honor'. This is particularly relevant for me right now. REALbasic has an O'Reilly book, and the author is prone to give page numbers in answer to questions, and not bother answering the questions. You wouldn't believe how much hostility you'd get for objecting to, even questioning, this state of affairs, even if you spend an hour revising your messages to tone them down. Right now I am being publically humiliated on the REALbasic mailing list, with virtually no support except from a few people such as one fellow who asked me to let it lie so the argument would cool down, for this crime: I suggested that many O'Reilly books were the redistillation of community knowledge, and sell on convenience rather than being proprietary information to be withheld from people who haven't bought the book. I also suggested that Tim O'Reilly understood this and approved of his authors being active and helpful in their communities. And I'm being _crucified_ for having the gall to claim these things!

    *sigh* If you write OSS for Windows, you can expect to put up with the same nonsense. You can expect to see everything from personal abuse to piles of FUD, you will be accused of wanting to destroy the livelihoods of your peers (to which my response is usually 'maybe' ;) ), and you might even end up in some ugly little tangle like claiming Apache (for instance) is open source, with your 'developer community' tearing you a new one and insisting there are bits you don't get to see, otherwise it wouldn't be secure! That may sound ridiculous, but I'd have thought "O'Reilly doesn't need to care about the community, it provides proprietary information in books and should be supported for doing it" was equally ridiculous, yet I'm sitting by letting myself be _roasted_ and my (such as it is) reputation savaged over just such a ridiculous distortion of what O'Reilly is about.

    Best thing I can do is let 'em, and the next time some newbie asks a question I can answer, answer it helpfully while others give page numbers of their books or offer example projects that are proprietary or classes/plugins that are closed. Doing that makes the newbies want to cooperate, because they see some people freely helping them and others leaving strings attached and pontificating about how there's no free lunch. Well- cooperation _is_ a free lunch, it's just that you're giving it as well as getting it. And it would be a poor world if nobody could ever use open source software unless they were willing to use nothing but. Small pockets of cooperators can survive even in the midst of total hostility, and if you're a pocket of one, you're an ambassador. It's my job as such an ambassador to soak up the abuse, even when it's just unfair, and try to look like somebody to emulate. And the code I do release is licensed with the GPL: one thing about closed-land is that people don't seem to act like they get to 'rip off' open code. Instead they freak out at the requirements, and flame you to a crisp for _daring_ to require that they GPL derivative works, never mind that if they had a derivative work it's only by copying big chunks of the original work verbatim. But at least they _are_ freaking out, as it'd be worse if they just took whatever they wanted without asking.

    Sometimes it's a real pain writing open on closed tools on a closed platform. Unfortunately, if nobody ever does, the closedness will never change. In that light, I have to encourage anyone trying to write open on Windows, in VB, or whatever. You'll get blasted from both sides- and you should try to set an example, _and_ take extra pains to make sure what you're doing _is_ as open as you possibly can make it- but it's worthwhile to do it.

  • Re:UCITA (Score:3)

    by um... Lucas ( 13147 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @08:30AM (#1229034) Journal
    The GPL grants you some rights but also restricts some rights as well. Nothing in life is free... Maybe free as in beer, maybe free as in speech, but there's a 3rd aspect of freedom which I can't name, but what must exist. Specifially, the GPL refuses to let you take your changes private. That's a restriction, if i'd ever seen one. Yes, the GPL is good, but in terms of projects that may become commercially viable, a LOT of thought needs to be put into using the GPL...

    For instance, co-opting. If Sun had licensed Java to Microsoft under the GPL, we'd have a completely fragmented Java right now. Microsoft could have made whatever changes they wanted, given the code back to sun, who would reject it, but then continue to distribute their code to the masses. Sun used a much stricter license, which means they could sheppard Java, make sure it was going in the direction they had forseen, and try to beat back people from outright destroying it.

    For all the advantages UCITA offers to open-source, it doubles that in disadvantages... Would Linux even exist if reverse engineering were barred? How about star office? UCITA strictly states that reverse engineering, even just for interoptibility, is barred. So, existing open source software would do just fine and dandy... But new projects intended to say, interoperate with MS Windows 2001, would be completely out of the picture, unless they were developed in whole outside of UCITA's grasp... Even then inviduals might be able to download those projects and use them in the States, but large companies certainly wouldn't want to take that chance.

  • One of the major (IMO) problems for GPL'ed software still exist under this dreamy picture of the UCITA. That is the problem of who's going to do the suing?

    For instance, you put together a neat little GPL'ed widget, and put it out there every one to use. Six months later you get an email from a friend of yours commenting that the latest Windows beta (or to be fair MacOS X DR) has a suspiciously similar widget in it. What are you going to do? Take on the hords of corporate lawyers?

    Yes, you are. As primary author (i.e. the originator) it is your responsibility to sue the corporations. Unless you sign the rights over to a publisher (temporarily), in which case they would be responsible for suing.

    You see this all falls back onto Copyright law, and UCITA is a lame attempt to circumvent perfectly good laws that exist now. Mainly because corporations are lazy and they want more "protections" than are really allowed by law.

    The GPL really is a great license, and I imagine that with the proper lawyers making the proper arguments, before the proper judge, then no one would stand chance if they were really in violation of it. That's the kicker though, "the proper judge." IME, most American judges don't much about the law, and IP law in particular, they know even less about software and computers. (Hey, they're mostly conservative, old men.) Often they'll side with the lawyer wearing the more expensive suit. (Ok, maybe that last crach was uncalled for, but I couldn't help it.) This doesn't mean that they aren't in general well-meaning or well-educated people, just that like the rest of us that are not experts in all things and not always infallible.

    Again, this doesn't constitute legal advice. If you need help, get a lawyer. We're just discussing opinions on the law and how things might play out in court. If you really needed to read this disclaimer, then buy a clue.

  • You're asking two distinct questions, so I'll address them one at a time.

    First, as to license, you want to retain control/ownership while making it open source. This is a balancing act. It helps to know exactly what community who want involved with your project. Some communities are ideologically oriented and won't work with any project that doesn't have their license. Other communities are content having less control than the author if it is software that they use (they want to make it better). You also need to think about whether you want the community to help you create the software, or just enhance and maintain it once it's done.

    The popular commercial OSS license would be good to look at. I hate to state any specific license because that's sure to start a war, but both the MPL and QPL are good for what you want.

    As for your second question, you should care less what the Slashdot community thinks about Windows :-) That's like asking Jazz fans with they think about Rock music. They're not going to be your community.

    But Windows certainly needs to get an Open Source community started! I don't mind commercial or closed-source programs, but in the Windows world, every two bit piece of trash written in VB ends up as shareware! But it's not necessarily their fault since Microsoft has increasingly ignored and insulted the small developer and hobbyist. When you have to spend several hundred dollars for a somewhat complete development environment, you want to get your money back.

    But all it takes is the realization that "freeware" doesn't have to be crappy before the community changes. And availability of the Windows SDK wouldn't hurt either.
  • It doesn't matter what the FSF thinks. The Artistic License meets every one of the FSF's criteria for Free Software. To say that a license needs to be A, B and C to be Free, and then to turn around and call a license unfree that meets these very points is disingenuous.

    Yes, the AL may be vague, but precision of language is not one of the criteria for Free Software. Of course, to some people, the AL is quite straight forward and precise in it's language.

  • Re:Naah, you're WAAAY wrong here. (Score:3)

    by Arandir ( 19206 ) on Friday March 03, 2000 @11:50AM (#1229076) Homepage Journal
    "And what would be the benefit of his "hang[ing] it all out and go[ing] BSD" -- except that that would make it perfectly legal for some sleazeball "entrepreneur" to hijack his code base, close it off, and start selling a "competing" copy of his work?"

    Oh please! I made it 80% of the way down the page without seeing any bullshit being slung about (which is amazing considering the topic), then I see you comment.

    I'll tell you what the BSDL does: it allows Apple to use 4.4BSD code in MacOSX without having to give anything back, yet they still give back! When you treat your users with respect, you'll get respect in return. But when you treat your users as potential thieves, don't be surprised when your users choose other software.

    My apologies to any GPL developers who treat their users with the respect due them. You are the vast majority. My tirade is only directed to the tiny minority of self-righteous license bigots.
  • I think the point is that because the meaning is not clear (at least, it might not be clear to a court), you can't use Artistic licensed software without running the risk of lawsuits and other nastiness.

    You may think the FSF are being overly cautious here, but you should never underestimate the stupidity of the legal system.

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