Andy,
I understand perfectly. Yegor works for a company in Moscow that the
company I work for has hired. Both he and I have filed CLA-I while
the company I work for has filed the CLA-C.
I'm waiting for someone who knows, like Nick, to weigh in on the CLA-
C questions.
I think that connection to OOXML would be great. I also think that
connection to Apache XML Graphics and FOP would be great. There is my
personal itch. I've got my 29 year old first edition of Knuth's TEK
and METAFONT ready for when I find time to explore that codebase.
OOXML gives us improved ways to get out of the MSFT box. It is my
hope that XML Graphics is a way out of the Adobe box. It is no longer
question of better, it is a question of is.
Generally my question about the guy who criticizes OOXML was really
to say that there are tradeoffs. I think there is a saying in
security to the effect that security by obscurity is not security at
all. Isn't there an Excel exploit going on right now?
Best Regards,
Dave
On Mar 26, 2008, at 11:31 PM, Andrew C. Oliver wrote:
No. If sourcesense is doing this as work for hire then the work is
probably owned by Microsoft. The patents are Microsoft's if they
apply to work source sense is doing or source sense is relying on
MS provided information covered by those patents. We want to keep
POI free of RAND, non-comm, and other restrictions. The question
remains: Has Microsoft Filed a CLA for any work for hire that
Sourcesense is doing? Did anyone ask them to? Why wouldn't they
be willing to?
I took the same position regarding OpenSAML which had a similar
issue at the time. POI must continue to be freely distributable
and free of field of use restrictions. I recently also supported
OSI's approval of Microsoft's open source licenses.
I think it will rock to have a mature open source OOXML in Java for
various reasons. Not the least of which that I'd like to never get
a OLE CDF/BIFF/etc doc ever again (binary non-streamable fragment
prone icky icky). It isn't an emotional thing or even a Microsoft
thing it is a patent and field of use restriction thing.
-Andy
David Fisher wrote:
Gianugo,
I think that the question is -
"Has Sourcesense filed a CLA?"
I am sure the answer is "yes", but I think the confirmation of it
might ease any concerns.
Keep in mind that the project has been significantly hurt by
Microsoft's past actions - a committer leaving the project due to
employment requiring a Microsoft NDA. I don't know about the
details it was before my time, but I know Andy was effected.
If we are talking news - the following starts off from where the
story Andy links left off.
http://www.cnet.com/8300-13505_1-16.html?keyword=OOXML
I'm really not trying to be critical but is the criticism found at
the following links of concern here:
http://ooxmlisdefectivebydesign.blogspot.com/2007/08/microsoft-
office-xml-formats-defective.html Or, would you say that they
provide some of the reasons you are here in the project?
Is there some email thread I should check in order to catch up on
a discussion?
Regards,
Dave
On Mar 26, 2008, at 10:18 PM, Gianugo Rabellino wrote:
On Mar 27, 2008, at 3:49 AM, Andrew C. Oliver wrote:
And to be crystal clear, I do want to see the work go in: naked
of patent restrictions. A CLA-C from the company that has
commissioned the work would satisfy me or some binding statement
that the contributions are distributable under terms compatible
with the Open Source Definition. that includes field of use
(commercial use).
... may I ask why you're demanding that this contribution has to
endure a special, more restrictive, treatment? What's wrong in
the ASF procedures to require additional burdens? I know, I know,
this is Microsoft, but still I'd say that this could be a good
test of current ASF best practices, and enforcing them would be
more than enough.
Ciao,
--Gianugo Rabellino
Sourcesense - making sense of Open Source: http://
www.sourcesense.com
Blogging at http://boldlyopen.com/
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