On 2/3/11 3:51 PM, Gary Whatmore wrote:
Steven Schveighoffer Wrote:
On Thu, 03 Feb 2011 16:41:08 -0500, Daniel Gibson<[email protected]>
wrote:
Am 03.02.2011 22:26, schrieb Steven Schveighoffer:
On Thu, 03 Feb 2011 16:03:55 -0500, Daniel Gibson
<[email protected]> wrote:
Am 03.02.2011 21:48, schrieb Tomek Sowiński:
Speaking of Tango, may I look at it? I remember that beef over the
first
datetime and it gives me shivers...
You probably shouldn't look at the source.
I dunno about the interface (documentation) - it's certainly not
illegal to take
inspiration from it, but maybe then people will again claim that
source was
stolen.. but when you claim that you haven't looked at the source it
may be ok..
It has been posited by Tango's developers that simply looking at the
documentation of a D library isn't enough to understand the library, you
probably have looked at the source. Until they change that opinion, I
would
avoid even the documentation.
http://lists.puremagic.com/pipermail/phobos/2010-April/000370.html
The pertinent quote from there:
"In my opinion, claiming a clean room implementation of an API in D is
difficult, if for no other reason that it is (due to imperfect doc
generation
etc) somewhat difficult to properly study a D API without at the same
time
reading the source (or glimpsing at it)."
They can claim whatever they want.. if Tomek says he only looked at the
documentation (for an idea how a good interface for a XML lib may look
like)
they can hardly prove anything.
This exact situation was the case of the prior-mentioned infringement
accusation.
It's sad to read how much these Tango assholes are trying to wreck the whole
language. I doubt their implementation is any better than the high performance
C++ libraries. I've been using RapidXML before and it's damn fast. My recipe
for success would be: use the Boost license, do a clean room implementation
inspired by the best C++ code, use ranges instead of slices or iterators, use
Phobos free function and naming conventions, get Andrei's blessing. This will
teach the Tango douchebags a lesson or two.
They always complain about us doing NIH code. But they're forcing us!
I think it's reasonable of me to ask avoiding reopening a debate that
has little chance of being solved by emotional rhetoric.
Regarding taking inspiration from Tango code, I don't know what the
exact licensing issues are but the lesson learned during past incidents
is clear: Phobos contributors should conservatively avoid looking at
Tango. This is not difficult because there are many XML libraries of
good quality and performance. So let's.
Thanks,
Andrei
