%% Christian Goetze <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>> First, Rational doesn't publish any API or other interface that would
>> allow GNU make to communicate with MVFS and construct the data required,
>> much less communicate it to the VOB and view servers. For years I asked
>> them for something like that; I've given up.
cg> It's really a pity that the free software community is so
cg> infatuated with CVS. It's a genuine case of "they don't know what
cg> they're missing", probably combined with a dose of general
cg> mistrust of SCM. I really think the time has come for some kind of
cg> open source MVFS...
I think this would be difficult. I'd be very surprised indeed if Atria
(now Rational) didn't hold patents on at least some of the crucial
aspects of MVFS.
Obviously there have been opaque filesystems around for a long time, but
MVFS is much more than just that (although you could make pretty cool
SCM toolset based on opaque filesystems, too...)
>> Second, it's not at all clear whether it would be legal, under the
>> GPL, to distribute GNU make sources modified in that way.
cg> I don't understand where the problem is here. As long as the code
cg> lineage is distinct, I don't see how the GPL would force you to
cg> reveal more than the GNU make side of the implementation. All
cg> you're doing is integrating API calls into GNU make.
Any code that is distributed with a GPL'd program must be legally
distributed under the GPL. Providing hooks specifically to proprietary
code could be considered (by the FSF and RMS) to be creating a derived
work, and as such not allowed.
The realities of this are murky at best. The only realistic course for
Rational to take would be to discuss this with RMS and see what he
says. If he says OK, they could do it. I have a vague recollection
that this was done by Atria a long time ago, and he said "not OK".
cg> If this weren't so, then the mere act of porting GNU make to some
cg> proprietary UNIX platform would be illegal too.
Not so. First, there are many implementations of all the functions GNU
make uses, including GLIBC itself, which is free. So, GNU make could be
written to use a free implementation and distributed that way. Remember
that there is no restriction in the GPL on what the end-user does with
the code, only on how the code can be distributed.
Second, and more importantly, there is an explicit clause in the GPL
which excludes system libraries like libc from these requirements.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
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These are my opinions---Nortel Networks takes no responsibility for them.
