On Oct 13, 2006, at 5:14 AM, Chris Withers wrote:
I have to echo Jens' sentiments though: why not just ship .py files and be done with it?
If I had to make a wild-ass guess, its because there's an indication that the mxodbc code would be misappropriated and proliferated outside of the control of the authors, a circumstance which they desire to avoid.
The alternative of shipping .pyc files (and still not letting source out the door) is to spend lots of time coming up with ways to pack source into .pyd files, which would be very clumsy. None of it actually prevents someone who knows the python internals from yanking source (or reconstructed source) back out, but it goes a long way to prevent those folks from saying "oh, well, all software *should* be free -- so I'll just delete this little licensing routine right here.... *snip* ta-da, I'm pleased to announce free-mxodbc to the world"
Actually I don't think anyone would be dumb enough to redistribute misappropriated code, but there ARE a lot of individuals out there whose sense of entitlement exceeds their common sense. I'm sure e- genix would be happy to release the source for a big enough lump sum to pay off their expected future licensing revenue, but in the interim their business model requires people to pay as they go. And since their charges are about the equivalent of a nice night out at an upscale restaurant (or a few passes through McDonalds with a minivan full of kids) I can't see anyone investing the time to write a replacement.
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