On Friday 03 September 2010 02:09:14 Narendra Sisodiya wrote: > On Thu, Sep 2, 2010 at 10:56 PM, A. Mani <[email protected]> wrote: > > On Wed, Sep 1, 2010 at 12:57 PM, jtd <[email protected]> wrote: > > >> On the other hand, there may be few exceptional cases, where > > >> it may be in the public interest to keep source code closed – > > >> such as software that breaks encryption. > > > > > > Oh god. DONT USE ENCRYPTION THAT HAS NOT BEEN PUBLICLY TESTED > > > FOR VULNERABILITIES. And when a vulnerability is exposed dump > > > it ASAP. > > > > Yes, that is the dumbest part of this public s/w nonsense > > Seems to be a project to protect things like 'US interests' at > > the cost of everybody else. > > A classical article on this is: > > http://www.schneier.com/crypto-gram-9909.html > > > > > > Best > > > > A. Mani > > *In my view, Guru should write only one line for defining public > software > > Public Software are publically o̶w̶n̶e̶d̶ licensed software. Ex > Software released under Free and Open Source Software.*
Narendra this statement is wrong. There is no Public licenced software, unless it is software specifically assigned to the public domain. Firstly such software may or may not include source code. This automatically makes such software FOSS incompatible. Secondly even when source code is available as public domain, nothing prevents a second party from using the code to create a larger or different body of work, creating and distributing binaries, and changing the terms of use for the larger works i.e not assigned to the public domain. FOSS specifically seeks to prevent such usurping and misuse. This too automatically makes such public software FOSS incompatible. I refrain from yakking on the software patents imbroglio, as we in India are (allegedly) protected from this madness. To me it seems like a two pronged strategy to hobble the Free Software movement ( Note I am not using the term Opensource). Firstly open a backdoor to get closed software into egovernance. Secondly release any government funded application development as public domain (the most preferred method) or BSDish licence (if the Freesoftware guys create a rukus), so that it can be incorporated into closed software, rather than releasing it under GPLV2/3. If one were to use a client-server model, the client would be free, but the server, database, protocols etc would continue to remain hostage to the closed software firms. Thus the client would be public software and the server side would be of no concern to any body, inspite of the fact that it is taxpayers money being squandered. There is only one unambiguos method: stop using the term public software, unless one is specifically referring to public domain software. Infact using the term OpenSource now seems dangerous. So far BSDish (or OpenSource) software when taken into the private domain, starts suffering from bitrot and extracts a heavy toll in maintanence costs. However when used in egovernance, it's the taxpayer that will foot the bill for bitrot. > He may explain "Why Public Software" to any extend but it may be a > good or bad to define public software with a full article which > says non-FOSS can be public software. > It will be best, non to define and just say, public software is > FOSS. -- Rgds JTD _______________________________________________ network mailing list [email protected] http://lists.fosscom.in/listinfo.cgi/network-fosscom.in
