On 20 May 2002, at 1:43, ZN wrote: > OK, I've been reading the licence discussion for quite a while and I find > it does make sense for a world where the following is clearly defined that: > > 1) A generic SMSQ core, common to ALL platforms (*) > 2) SMSQ extensions, or more precisely, additions or changes to the core, > start as a submissions to the registrar, and become, if accepted, a part of > the next official core issue if aproved. > 3) Add-ons, i.e. is everything that goes 'on top' of SMSQ but is not part > of the core, and is probably speciffic to a particular platform.
Oh great, somebody actually understands what we're trying to achieve. > [Digression: (*) this 'common to all platforms' is a bit of an idealist > view, a discussion for some other time] Yes, yes and yes! > This may seem like an odd argument, but it is paramount for the issue of > developement, support, distribution - not to mention that a clear > definition of the above three is (or should be!) one of the main criteria > used by the registrar to decide what becomes a part of SMSQ and what does > not. > > If the above were true, whoever wants to have SMSQ on a different platform, > would not strictly need to distribute the binary, but could instead point > the users to one of the distributors, and offer the necessary add-ons to > the core and a way to link everything, to make it work on that platform, > removing the platform speciffic parts from under the coverage of the > licence, and regulating the distribution and support for said as they see > fit. true - however, it would be easier to distribute, as a reseller, one "patched" version that runs right away on the new machine. After all, I presume the new users buy a machine from you- and they will come back to you for support. Will the additional 10 EUR you charge for TT's work really be that much more of an imposition? > In case a developer wants to do something with the core to enable new > functionality, they would be able to get the official source under the > conditions stipulated in the licence, see what and how would need changes, > implement betas and have them distributed under the conditions of the > licence (which I do find somewhat restrictive but not impossible), and > eventually, propose their inclusion into the official generic core. > Provided the registrar was convinced the proposed was or could be > beneficial to everyone (**), and not only everyone - let's definbe everyone as meaining veryone on that machine. For example, the Q60 has a LED port. Th. Godefroy wrote some software to use it. Suppose he porposed that for inclusion iin the OS (I have NO idea whether he would or not, I haven't discussed this with him, it's just an example). Why should I not allow it in, even though it would profit only Q60 users? Likewise, QPC has the DOS device. Why shouldn't that be part of the OS inSMSQ/E, even though only QPC would profit from it. I WOULD like to see developments that profit all versions of all machines. > it would then be included into the next > official core, at which point the developer can use that to implement > speciffic add-ons of their own, again handled outside of the core licence. yes! > [Digression: (**) a mechanism should be in place for the registrar to > distribute certain beta versions simply because he would be in the best > position to know the key developers for speciffic cases where a proposed > change may have wide impact] true! > The problem is, this is not the actual situation. Instead, we have SMSQ > which has relatively monolitic parts some of which may be essential for one > group and at the same time of no interest whatsoever for another. Because > of the absurd idea that every platform or flavour thereof should have it's > own SMSQ version, it is simply IMPOSSIBLE to write a licence agreement > which would satisfy everyone to an acceptable degree. Arguments like 'I > paid for a feature and why should I submit it and have anyone but me > benefit from it (financially)' are forever going to be oposed to 'I don't > want to pay for anything because I only do things for free', and that's > only the benign tip of the iceberg. We could collectively come up with a > myriad scenarios in which any given wording of the licence would not work. > I sincerely hope that not even an attempt will be made to cater for > everything!!! no. > What I would be doing to break this deadlock, is the following: get the > current official source under the current licence. Have a good long look at > it and figure out how to make a generic core from it. Then propose THAT to > the registrar. Sounds like a lot of work for little gains? The way I see > it, this may indeed be true in the short run. But if it's not ultimately > done, we'll soon all be throwing in the towel because without this and a > clear division what falls under the licence and what does not, i.e. without > a clear picture of what SMSQ is and what it can grow into, the best we can > hope for is for a situation where 'read TTs code' will be replaced by 'read > ?s code' when it gets into the official release. > yes. I haven't has time to have a real look at the code which I have now received. For me, the first "hurdle" will be to get it to compile for each platform. When I have done that, I can try to unify everything as much as possible. If I have to do this alone, it will take years. Wolfgang ----------------- www.wlenerz.com
