> As I understand it, the SageMathCloud is closed source. Yet it is > making extensive use of open-source code. Maybe the closed source bits > don't link to the open-source bits, though I find it a bit hard to > believe. If it did not link, it would not that be against the GPL? Or > I guess if the code is not distibuted, but only kept on a server, it > probably gets around the GPL. > > Correct. Sage is not AGPL.
> If not against the GPL, this certainly seems to be going against the > *spirit* of the Sage project. It looks as though the intention is to > charge for access to a web service which makes use of open-source code > developed by many - myself included. > > One might argue it is the same with any web service making use of > Apache for example, although I still think a closed-source > SageMathCloud is pushing the limits of what some (myself included), > find morally acceptable. > > I will purposely ignore the flamefest sure to follow any license discussion ;-) but will just say that William has already BSD-licensed some of the code related to this, so it's not even now as bad as all that. My understanding is that long-term closing the source for the NoSQL-type database interactions is so that someone unconnected to Sage can't also charge for Sage-as-a-service (at least not without developing their own way of doing it); there may be other reasons (like raising funds for Sage development). But William has committed several times to making a "personal use" version that wouldn't be scalable to thousands of users that uses an open-source license, once SMC is not quite as beta. So even for those of us who would prefer a different licensing scheme, I don't think the commitment to open source math has changed here, though I sympathize with your comments and voiced similar ones a couple years ago. Naturally, there are those who would prefer all code be open, and others that all code be closed... but given that we have a project with many different opinions on the universality of it, and that Sage itself is not affected, probably this is as good of a compromise that one could get. Now let the flamefest begin! (Or, if we all are gentle to one another, let it NOT begin...) - kcrisman -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "sage-devel" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to sage-devel+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
