Hi *, > On the long run I think the Apache-Way means we give > prevalence to freedom over features so we either move > back to MySpell
it has already been said that MySpell is a step backward
> or we do something completely new based
> on Apache openNLP.
"we" means here "software developers in the know of this topic", and
I don't read much names of those in this thread. I mean, someone with
the knowledge has to sit and write code. So why starting something new
from scratch when we already have something that works, and fits
"The Apache Way"?
OOo has three kind of linguistic components:
* spell checker
* hyphenator
* thesaurus
OOo provides a default implementation for the three by means of
Hunspell:
1) hunspell - LGPLv2+ or GPLv2+ or MPLv1.1
http://hunspell.cvs.sourceforge.net/viewvc/hunspell/hunspell/COPYING?view=markup
2) hyphen - LGPLv2+ or MPLv1.1
http://hunspell.cvs.sourceforge.net/viewvc/hunspell/hyphen/COPYING?view=markup
3) mythes - BSD
http://hunspell.cvs.sourceforge.net/viewvc/hunspell/mythes/README?view=markup#l38
(3) with the BSD license is compatible with the Apache License
http://www.apache.org/legal/resolved.html#category-a
(1) and (2) with the MPLv1.1 are "weak copyleft", this means both
libraries "may be included in binary form within an Apache product if
the inclusion is appropriately labeled"
http://www.apache.org/legal/resolved.html#category-b
And this is what actually happens with the three libraries: ./bootstrap
fetches the compressed files, and the libraries are built in
trunk/main/hunspell
trunk/main/hyphen
trunk/main/mythes
Look at the folders:
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/incubator/ooo/trunk/main/hunspell/
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/incubator/ooo/trunk/main/mythes/
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/incubator/ooo/trunk/main/hyphen/
there are only patches and makefiles, no copyleft source.
AOOo can keep Hunspell based linguistic components, there is no need to
remove anything, it is already IP-clean.
A source release will never include the sources for these components,
as it never did if you downloaded an archived version from
hg.services.openoffice.org
Of course, these components are useless without the dictionaries, but
dictionaries are *extensions*, the user can install the extension; OOo
has already a menu item that opens the download page
http://svn.apache.org/viewvc/incubator/ooo/trunk/main/sfx2/source/appl/appserv.cxx?revision=1198289&view=markup#l852
As Ricardo (RGB ES) said, this was always the case with the Spanish
dictionary: the bundled version was useless (it was an es-ES targeted
extension, not even valuable for the Spanish from Spain).
So I don't see a drawback here for the common user, nor the power user.
The situation is almost the same as before.
Regards
--
Ariel Constenla-Haile
La Plata, Argentina
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