Em Wed, 19 Nov 2014 14:05:53 -0700 (MST) Jon Trulson <j...@radscan.com> escreveu:
> I have no objection to supporting autotool builds for CDE (but we need > to not break or remove Imake support either). Nice to hear it. Naturally, for the GNU build system, I'm thinking in an approach different of that taken by the developers who have designed the original Imake build recipes (and consequently that of Oleksiy's patch which follow them closely). The original Imake files are oriented towards a fixed set of software/hardware platforms --- that's understandable, given the static nature of Imake-based build systems and the proprietary history of CDE. However, the ideal prospect GNU build system would, instead, adapt itself by testing for low-level features at configuration time, without alluding to any fixed set of rules based on a list of directives beforehand derived from the knowledge of the target hardware and software. Theoretically, one of the added benefit would be that the chances of CDE building successfully on an uncommon system, which we don't know or don't have access to, would increase. > Now CDE is an open source project, but we would *really* like to avoid > being forced into a specific license if at all possible - this is why > we request MIT licensing. Here we have a problem. In the GNU project we are mainly concerned with user's freedom. We believe the GPLv3+ is the appropriate license for programs like the ones CDE is composed of. Our policy, however, is of contributing to existing projects under their licenses, in order to facilitate collaboration, unless our changes are big enough that copylefting them is justifiable. Nonetheless, CDE is a particular case since all its code is released under LGPLv2+, even if developers are requiring contributions to be MIT[1][sic] licensed, and as so we deem important to maintain its copyleft status. > If some of the autotool scripts are not MIT, I think we can live with > that. If the GNU folks want to whine about it, we can remove it, or > make it optional. I can't see us getting sued for it. > > I am definitely in favor of making the building of CDE more robust and > adaptive. That's good! > > On Sourceforge there are 8 forks of CDE's VCS code, but none of them > > implements Oleksiy changes, or any other in the direction of GNU > > Autotools. Even if a patch for this end was accepted by the main > > developers, they would still require Imake build system to be > > working in parallel (imagine the mess), dragging the development of > > a efficient, stable and standard build system. > > Why would this need to be the case? What mess are you imagining? The mess of having to maintain two separate and technically very different building systems, doubling the work of test and implementation, and increasing the likelihood of breaking things. > Huh? What's wrong with a permissive license? It would be nice > someday to re-license CDE as MIT, like X11. Can't get any more > permissive than that. But -- I do not get to choose the license. > It's LGPL by decision of The Open Group who owns CDE. For the pragmatic point of view of what's wrong with a permissive license and why we should use copyleft see [2]. For a philosophical one see [3]. > > CDE's original project could still fill the niche of supporting > > ancient proprietary unices, with its ancient build system and > > worries about retro-compatibility for an undefined amount of time, > > eventually and deliberately letting some self-interested people or > > corporation take away CDE's users freedom; the freedom that take so > > much time and efforts to achieve! > > > > Again, huh? > > Exactly what freedom(s) are you giving up here? I'm not giving up any particular freedom, but not copylefting code copyrighted by you is failing to protect users from any third party that may want to take away their freedom in self-interest. The GNU project believes that's harmful for the free software community and society in general in the long run. That's why we don't agree with CDE developers' policy of requiring contributions to be under a permissive license. > Why can't an autotools system co-exist with Imake? In principle it can, but I don't see why If we had an appropriate GNU build system replacement. > We like contributions. We aren't interested in ideology though, at > least I'm not. That's a major disagreement between us. The GNU project, myself included --- as a GNU hacker, holds that the ethical principles which guide us in the defense of computer users' freedom are fundamental. > Also, if you fork, you are still bound by the same licening issues we > are. That's true, but for us there is no issue because we can release the resulting work as GPLv3+, exactly as we would like to. > Well, we get a free platform for development... I don't read the ads > attached to mailing list messages. Do you? No, I don't. That doesn't mean I'm not annoyed by them, though. > Is the real issue here that we request contributions be MIT? > Is that the crux of your complaint? Pretty much. Footnotes: [1] The term "MIT license" is misleading, as there is no particular license named like that and the MIT has used many different licenses for software. Often it refers either to the X11 license or the Expat license. [2] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/pragmatic.html [3] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/freedom-or-power.html -- ,= ,-_-. =. Bruno Félix Rezende Ribeiro (oitofelix) [0x28D618AF] ((_/)o o(\_)) There is no system but GNU; `-'(. .)`-' GNU Linux-Libre is one of its official kernels; \_/ All software must be free as in freedom; ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Download BIRT iHub F-Type - The Free Enterprise-Grade BIRT Server from Actuate! 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