On Mon, 2003-03-10 at 17:24, Richard Braakman wrote: > > My rule of thumb is that if you ever find yourself in a situation where > the technically ideal solution is blocked by software licensing, then > you're not dealing with free software. This is my version of freedom 0. > (You could always get around software licensing by reimplementing the > software in question... but that's why I don't consider it free software.)
So, any license which is incompatible with any other is non-free? > The GPL skirts the edge of this: for example, the requirement to > distribute source is ok because you can include a "written offer" > if there's no room for the source. (Even this has its problems, though. > If you're launching an interplanetary probe that uses GPLed software, > do you have include a source CD? Or carve the offer into the probe's > hull? Every byte might count. I'd go for the offer, and hope that > Martians will request the source so that we can make them pay for > the next probe.) The offer also only needs to be good for three years -- by the time the Martians get a reply out, it's probably too late :) Still, if you're sending software to space, it's *good* to include the source code, so that they can alter the software to send the probe back to us. > I think 2(a) and 2(c) go over the edge. For 2(a), there are file > formats where it's difficult to add a change history. People seem > to deal with that by ignoring it. We ought to allow changelogs there, I agree. -- -Dave Turner Stalk Me: 617 441 0668 "On matters of style, swim with the current, on matters of principle, stand like a rock." -Thomas Jefferson
