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Macromedia Applies For OSI Certification

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the what-will-they-release dept.

mpawlo writes "As reported by Greplaw, Macromedia, the company behind Flash-technology and more, has applied for open source certification of one of its licenses. The Macromedia license is based on the IBM Public License. You can see the Application for certification as well as the The Macromedia licence."

5 of 186 comments (clear)

  1. In other news, RMS dies of acute depression by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    A story about open source certification posted under the GNU topic?

  2. Mod Parent down by phoxix · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Sorry, but this honestly has to be one of the most disgusting posts I have ever read.

    There were plenty of companies back in the old days that did not support Linux. And yet that is understandable because in all honesty, it didn't make much sense financially to support linux (ask Id software about this, they've been behind linux forever.) Now however, times have changed. For the first time ever, supporting linux may not be a burden, but something that is actually 'pretty cool' (how good linux is to a company financially is still beyond us.)

    As linux users, it is not in our place to slap the wrists of those that did not support us in the past. But too rather sit here and help them. I for sure welcome Macromedia into the OSS arena. While I too have yet to see the outcome, I'm sure any thing the contribute will be greatly . appreciated.

    (And when you think about it, you come to the realization that Macromedia is a far better company than Adobe. And if you thought about it some more, you'd realize Adobe is even worse than Microsoft is.)

    Sunny

  3. Re:flash: makes coders lazy. by spage · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Coders could easily use dhtml and animated gifs to create effective animations on their page, however instead they use bloated swf files that need state of the art pc's just to run simple animations.

    Don't blame the bloat on the file format. SWF files are neck-and-neck with large animated GIFs since they're vector-based and use outline fonts; and a simple drop-down menu in Flash is very compact code compared with roll-over GIFs in DHTML layers. I've built both. If you're Microsoft and you can cram your creative designer's chosen font into the OS, then DHTML *text* layers are extremely compact, but everyone else trying to use a corporate font should find SWFs smaller.

    Macromedia's own global nav movie with three fonts and a text box is all of 12.2 kB (the static GIF version may be smaller but has no rollovers). BTW, most users never realize such "quiet" animations are Flash, it's the James Bond-movie-trailer-on-acid intros that you can only do in Flash that give it the Flashy reputation.

    Hey, use whatever works for you; Macromedia Dreamweaver is a fine tool for developing cross-browser DHTML animations, as is vim.

    --
    =S
  4. Re:Oooooooh well. by bons · · Score: 5, Insightful
    And here we have a perfect example of the greed that has stepped into the shoes of Free (as in Beer) software. Someone who not only has hopped on the bandwagon because, hey, Linux is cool, but now sees their position on the bandwagon to allow they to make a profit, while at the same time pointing the finger at someone else because they want to make a profit.

    And what's more amazing is that someone modded it up. (Note. In the course of this essay, someone got smart and correct that little bit of insanity. Thanks.)

    Macromedia has, for quite a long time, been much more open with it's technology than other companies. Any other group has been able to download the specs, sample code, and write programs that either display or create swf files.

    Various Source Code files for playing, reading, or writing flash files.

    SWF Format Specification

    Meanwhile Macromedia has been supporting Linux for awhile now. You can get a Flash 5 player for Linux (they're currently working on the Flash 6 player) and ColfFusion for Linux, Heck they even have a link to Slashdot.

    Are they SourceForge or FreshMeat or some other part of ODSN? Heck no. They're a company. just like any other, but while they may not meet the various acid tests everyone here is proposing, what they are doing is trying to do the Right Thing (tm). They are becoming more open. They're starting to embrace the philosophy. They're taking the risk.

    And for that, they should be rewarded, not punished, lest we drive everyone else away as well.

    --

    No Zen is good zen

  5. Re:Not an expert... by jchristopher · · Score: 5, Insightful
    +3, interesting, huh?

    What's REALLY interesting is that everyone assumes that this article is in regards to Flash - but the guy who submitted the request to review the Macromedia license is working on CFML language development.

    That's right, ColdFusion. In my opinion, an open-source ColdFusion would be a hell of a lot more interesting than an open source Flash.

    The Flash format is already public, and there are 3rd party tools that can write .swf files. ColdFusion, on the other hand, would have all kinds of interesting possibilities if open-sourced. One positive effect might be the improvement of the ease of use of other languages...