Also, the problem doesn't come up merely by not distributing source code with binaries, but by not making it available at all. One can comply with the GPL in ways other than distributing source code with binaries. Distributing both source code and binaries simultaneously from the same location is probably the most convenient way to comply.
No. The FAQ explicitly states that you must offer the source through mail for a small fee if you do not ship source with the binaries. It doesn't matter how you distribute the thing.
You're supposed to provide the source code by mail-order on a physical medium, if someone orders it. You are welcome to offer people a way to copy the corresponding source code by FTP, in addition to the mail-order option, but FTP access to the source is not sufficient to satisfy section 3 of the GPL.
When a user orders the source, you have to make sure to get the source to that user. If a particular user can conveniently get the source from you by anonymous FTP, fine--that does the job. But not every user is on a network. The rest of the users are just as entitled to get the source code from you, which means you must be prepared to send it to them by post.
If the FTP access is convenient enough, perhaps no one will choose to mail-order a copy. If so, you will never have to ship one. But you cannot assume that.
Of course, it's easiest to just send the source with the binary in the first place.
Now, a lot of people would think that if you distribute the binary via FTP, having a source package right next to it would be 'distributing source with the binary', just with the option for the user of actually taking it or refraining as they see fit. I strongly suspect that FSF:s interpretation rather is that the source must accompany the binary in the same, single, package. The argument for mail is that people may not have access to a network (which they evidently had thirty seconds earlier, when downloading the binary). At the same time, there seems to be no specification as to what physical medium to use; I could mail a QIC40 tape with the source and not having to worry if you can dredge up a tape unit able to read it. Yes, this is stupid.
Oh, BTW, if question #8 is about static linking, please make this clear; as it stands, you can answer either way, depending on how you interpret the question.
I say it is faster from personal experience. For me, switching desktops is easily twice as fast with metacity than with sawfish - and it is with 'equivalent' themes. Same thing with moving windows; there's none of the jerkiness I see when moving stuff under sawfish.
Don't get me wrong - I like sawfish. But when another wm hass all functionality I use anyway, and uses less resources, the choice isn't that difficult.
I started using metacity two weeks ago or so, and I'm fairly pleased. I really liked sawfish, but felt it was time to try something new.
Pro: easy to set up (not a whole lot of options to choose from, really), fast (much speedier than sawfish), and largely with sensible defaults for everything.
Con: I miss a few settings, like the ability to remember window size and position. Also, lazy focus only changes focus and does not raise the newly focused window.
On the whole, a good, solid windowmanager that really feels lean and efficient.
It won't work under Wine yet (though there are some wine hacks), but there is some work towards fixing this here. Check out the mailing list, as that's where most of the info is right now. Any Wine hackers with actual knowledge on these systems are _very_ welcome to pitch in!
The game itself is coming out for Linux, of course.
Using IO and local storage; looks like they want to create a "web within the web" - except here they control the client and all the content. No more pesky 'open standards'. And, of course, if you want to create content, you'll have to pay the man...
When you posted this comment, your moderations in this forum were automagically removed. It's a god thing to know in case you regret a moderation some other time as well.
I worked summer at a company, programming a PDP11. In addition to the PDP, there were a number of VAXen used for various tasks. We had ordered a new machine from Digital - a complete stýstem with disks, documentation and all. It came on two fully loaded pallets; unfortunately, the shippers came to the site fairly late on friday, and someone (still unclear) told them to just dump the pallets outside the building they were going to. Also, nobody saw fit to call anybody about the arrived shipment.
Come monday morning, it had rained hard the entire shipment was soaked. The plastic wrapping around the boxes weren't tight enough to keep the water out - the manuals were so soggy they could have been wrung through. In the end we didn't accept the shipment, and returned the pallets, and got a replacement from Digital.
Contrast this when, once, we ordered a serial cable. The cable came in a three-foot by three foot shrinkwrapped and taped box, filled almost completely filled with that shock absorbing stuff - and a coiled cable (in its own sealed bag), rattling aroung in a corner of the box.
Tell them that by allow you to open-source it, they will no longer be dependent on you for maintenance; they can hire anybody to do any revisions. Remind them that without this move, the IP will still be yours and they will have to negotiate with you for improvements and further development, and that if they want the IP themselves, that will mean a cost increase for them.
As a second, less important, benefit you can mention that there is a possibility that others will pick it up for use in their projects, and those improvements will benefit them without it costing them anything at all.
When they ask why they should pay you to write it in the first place if you're just going to turn around and open it, point out that without a developer under contract to write it, it won't be written at all in the first place. Emphasize that the open sourcing is about the maintenance of the software after it's been written, not about a different model for the development.
Of course, the use for Linux on a mainframe _is_ as a low- to medium server, running virtually atop VM. I have not sen anybody seriously advocate running Linux as the base OS on such a machine.
If your egg-hatching probability application is going to be used only within your own organisation, you can include any GPL code you want and not show the source. Only if you distribute the application will you need to release the source.
That's the problem with these kind of reviews; Mozilla is at RC1 and Galeon is at 1.2 - I assume the other browsers are similarily updated. A review of such software needs to be done almost literally within a week or two, or it will be obsolete and/or wrong by the time it reaches its readership. Reviewers really should take note of that, and maybe include a small section on what is happening to each product in developer-land.
Look no further than Anjuta ( http://anjuta.sourceforge.net ). It integrates the build system, gdb, glade and Scintilla into one neat and consistent package.
Cheap and easy? That monthly fee is about double what I pay for my landline telephony, including all call charges. For that price, I just don't see the point (well, that and that I don't live in the US...)
It works the other way, unfortunately. The stock market is very focused on short-term results, and firing people means less expense, and thus higher profits (or smaller loss) for the quarter, which inflates the stock price. Never mind that it puts the company in an impossible situation six months or a year down the road; you can always sell off the stock before that happens.
Solving cash flow problems in this way is _not_ a good idea. First, the workplace will rumble with the roar of resumes being printed and sent to competitors by all competent staff. Second, if the customers get a whiff of this (and they might), some may decide not to do business with a sinking ship and leave (or at least postpone any contracts), and put the company in ever more difficulties than before.
Better, actually, to acknowledge that the staffing is too high, and cut some staff outright. Better for the company, and, really, better for the staff that do not have to live in a constant state of anxiety and insecurity while trying to do their job. I mean, what do you prefer: get cut outright, with a couple of months salary in your pocket and free tolook for something better; or losing half your pay for a month, maybe for the next month as well, then maybe get cut anyway (or see the company collapse) and never see that money again - and all the while expected to do your job instead of having time and energy to search for a better one?
Now, isn't the point of encapsulation and abstraction that you don't need to care about the underlying implementation? Having a library where you need to (for all non-trivial applications) just defeats the purpose of all that complexity in the first place.
Um, first it's Bioware that makes it, not Black Isle (they have nothing to do with this game). Second, be aware that the editor will not run under Linux or Mac. Hopefully, Wine will be able to run it at some point, but as the 'creature browser' available for downoad does not, it seems it won't yet.
No. Other than at real low speeds (when you have to jiggle the handlebars to even stay upright), you steer by shifting your weight. The front wheel needs to be able to turn for it to work, but the turning is a result of your leaning, not the cause. This can easily be seen by cycling without holding the handlebars; it's as easy to turn as it is normally; your holding the bars only secure you better to the frame and provides damping to the steering.
This is much more obvious in the case of motorcycles, where the steering components are heavier and the speeds are higher; youturn by mentally "push" the handle at the side you want to turn (to go left, you "push" the left handlebar forward). This has the effect of moving your weight slightly to the left side, as wellas a small turn of the wheel to the right. The right turn makes the bike lean left, and the casting of the front wheel will make the bike turn left.
It would maybe not make sense directly. However, set an LDAP system as a front-end to the database, and you can access all the data you need in a standard way; connect several library databases into one homogenous virtual database and so on.
Maybe (and this is blue-sky territory) have a personal LDPA server that in turn accesses all the data you have access to - search for 'Turing', and you will get Google links, references to his papers (with abstracts, and maybe full-text), and information on what publications are available at your local library, through inter-library loans, and what they would cost you to buy at any of several online bookstores.
Maybe libglade is what you are looking for. Glade generates an XML description of the UI which is used to generate the UI code. Libglade reads the XML file at runtime to generate the UI instead, so you can tweak that XML file without having to touch your code.
Slashdot Mirror
No. The FAQ explicitly states that you must offer the source through mail for a small fee if you do not ship source with the binaries. It doesn't matter how you distribute the thing.
Now, a lot of people would think that if you distribute the binary via FTP, having a source package right next to it would be 'distributing source with the binary', just with the option for the user of actually taking it or refraining as they see fit. I strongly suspect that FSF:s interpretation rather is that the source must accompany the binary in the same, single, package. The argument for mail is that people may not have access to a network (which they evidently had thirty seconds earlier, when downloading the binary). At the same time, there seems to be no specification as to what physical medium to use; I could mail a QIC40 tape with the source and not having to worry if you can dredge up a tape unit able to read it. Yes, this is stupid.
Oh, BTW, if question #8 is about static linking, please make this clear; as it stands, you can answer either way, depending on how you interpret the question.
/Janne
Congratulations to the KDE team! Projects like these have a fairly high visibility, and it's good to see solid releases.
Now, when Gnome2 comes out I'll be _really_ happy!
/Janne
I say it is faster from personal experience. For me, switching desktops is easily twice as fast with metacity than with sawfish - and it is with 'equivalent' themes. Same thing with moving windows; there's none of the jerkiness I see when moving stuff under sawfish.
Don't get me wrong - I like sawfish. But when another wm hass all functionality I use anyway, and uses less resources, the choice isn't that difficult.
/Janne
I started using metacity two weeks ago or so, and I'm fairly pleased. I really liked sawfish, but felt it was time to try something new.
Pro: easy to set up (not a whole lot of options to choose from, really), fast (much speedier than sawfish), and largely with sensible defaults for everything.
Con: I miss a few settings, like the ability to remember window size and position. Also, lazy focus only changes focus and does not raise the newly focused window.
On the whole, a good, solid windowmanager that really feels lean and efficient.
/Janne
It won't work under Wine yet (though there are some wine hacks), but there is some work towards fixing this here. Check out the mailing list, as that's where most of the info is right now. Any Wine hackers with actual knowledge on these systems are _very_ welcome to pitch in!
The game itself is coming out for Linux, of course.
/Janne
Using IO and local storage; looks like they want to create a "web within the web" - except here they control the client and all the content. No more pesky 'open standards'. And, of course, if you want to create content, you'll have to pay the man...
I'm getting sick of this.
/Janne
When you posted this comment, your moderations in this forum were automagically removed. It's a god thing to know in case you regret a moderation some other time as well.
/Janne
I worked summer at a company, programming a PDP11. In addition to the PDP, there were a number of VAXen used for various tasks. We had ordered a new machine from Digital - a complete stýstem with disks, documentation and all. It came on two fully loaded pallets; unfortunately, the shippers came to the site fairly late on friday, and someone (still unclear) told them to just dump the pallets outside the building they were going to. Also, nobody saw fit to call anybody about the arrived shipment.
Come monday morning, it had rained hard the entire shipment was soaked. The plastic wrapping around the boxes weren't tight enough to keep the water out - the manuals were so soggy they could have been wrung through. In the end we didn't accept the shipment, and returned the pallets, and got a replacement from Digital.
Contrast this when, once, we ordered a serial cable. The cable came in a three-foot by three foot shrinkwrapped and taped box, filled almost completely filled with that shock absorbing stuff - and a coiled cable (in its own sealed bag), rattling aroung in a corner of the box.
/Janne
Tell them that by allow you to open-source it, they will no longer be dependent on you for maintenance; they can hire anybody to do any revisions. Remind them that without this move, the IP will still be yours and they will have to negotiate with you for improvements and further development, and that if they want the IP themselves, that will mean a cost increase for them.
As a second, less important, benefit you can mention that there is a possibility that others will pick it up for use in their projects, and those improvements will benefit them without it costing them anything at all.
When they ask why they should pay you to write it in the first place if you're just going to turn around and open it, point out that without a developer under contract to write it, it won't be written at all in the first place. Emphasize that the open sourcing is about the maintenance of the software after it's been written, not about a different model for the development.
/Janne
Of course, the use for Linux on a mainframe _is_ as a low- to medium server, running virtually atop VM. I have not sen anybody seriously advocate running Linux as the base OS on such a machine.
/Janne
If your egg-hatching probability application is going to be used only within your own organisation, you can include any GPL code you want and not show the source. Only if you distribute the application will you need to release the source.
/Janne
That's the problem with these kind of reviews; Mozilla is at RC1 and Galeon is at 1.2 - I assume the other browsers are similarily updated. A review of such software needs to be done almost literally within a week or two, or it will be obsolete and/or wrong by the time it reaches its readership. Reviewers really should take note of that, and maybe include a small section on what is happening to each product in developer-land.
/Janne
Thanks! I'm getting around 120KB/s from you.
/Janne
The hall of the Valar, or the home of the gods in nordic mythology.
/Janne
Not generating heat to begin with?
I wonder how this compares to modern flourescent light fixtures.
/Janne
Look no further than Anjuta ( http://anjuta.sourceforge.net ). It integrates the build system, gdb, glade and Scintilla into one neat and consistent package.
/Janne
Cheap and easy? That monthly fee is about double what I pay for my landline telephony, including all call charges. For that price, I just don't see the point (well, that and that I don't live in the US...)
/Janne
It works the other way, unfortunately. The stock market is very focused on short-term results, and firing people means less expense, and thus higher profits (or smaller loss) for the quarter, which inflates the stock price. Never mind that it puts the company in an impossible situation six months or a year down the road; you can always sell off the stock before that happens.
/Janne
Solving cash flow problems in this way is _not_ a good idea. First, the workplace will rumble with the roar of resumes being printed and sent to competitors by all competent staff. Second, if the customers get a whiff of this (and they might), some may decide not to do business with a sinking ship and leave (or at least postpone any contracts), and put the company in ever more difficulties than before.
Better, actually, to acknowledge that the staffing is too high, and cut some staff outright. Better for the company, and, really, better for the staff that do not have to live in a constant state of anxiety and insecurity while trying to do their job. I mean, what do you prefer: get cut outright, with a couple of months salary in your pocket and free tolook for something better; or losing half your pay for a month, maybe for the next month as well, then maybe get cut anyway (or see the company collapse) and never see that money again - and all the while expected to do your job instead of having time and energy to search for a better one?
/Janne
Now, isn't the point of encapsulation and abstraction that you don't need to care about the underlying implementation? Having a library where you need to (for all non-trivial applications) just defeats the purpose of all that complexity in the first place.
/Janne
Um, first it's Bioware that makes it, not Black Isle (they have nothing to do with this game). Second, be aware that the editor will not run under Linux or Mac. Hopefully, Wine will be able to run it at some point, but as the 'creature browser' available for downoad does not, it seems it won't yet.
/Janne
You do know it's coming out for Mac and Linux as well (in the same box, no less), don't you?
/Janne
No. Other than at real low speeds (when you have to jiggle the handlebars to even stay upright), you steer by shifting your weight. The front wheel needs to be able to turn for it to work, but the turning is a result of your leaning, not the cause. This can easily be seen by cycling without holding the handlebars; it's as easy to turn as it is normally; your holding the bars only secure you better to the frame and provides damping to the steering.
This is much more obvious in the case of motorcycles, where the steering components are heavier and the speeds are higher; youturn by mentally "push" the handle at the side you want to turn (to go left, you "push" the left handlebar forward). This has the effect of moving your weight slightly to the left side, as wellas a small turn of the wheel to the right. The right turn makes the bike lean left, and the casting of the front wheel will make the bike turn left.
/Janne
It would maybe not make sense directly. However, set an LDAP system as a front-end to the database, and you can access all the data you need in a standard way; connect several library databases into one homogenous virtual database and so on.
Maybe (and this is blue-sky territory) have a personal LDPA server that in turn accesses all the data you have access to - search for 'Turing', and you will get Google links, references to his papers (with abstracts, and maybe full-text), and information on what publications are available at your local library, through inter-library loans, and what they would cost you to buy at any of several online bookstores.
/Janne
Maybe libglade is what you are looking for. Glade generates an XML description of the UI which is used to generate the UI code. Libglade reads the XML file at runtime to generate the UI instead, so you can tweak that XML file without having to touch your code.
/Janne