GNUe Traffic #95 For 23 Aug 2003 Editor: Peter Sullivan By Arturas Kriukovas and Peter Sullivan "ok new deal - a dozen GNUe shirts to the first hacker that clones jcater?" Table Of Contents * Standard Format * Text Format * XML Source * Introduction * Threads Covered 1. 15 Aug 2003 Impact of improving unicode support on other parts of GNUe 2. 18 Aug 2003 Licensing implications of writing applications in GNUe 3. 19 Aug 2003 0.5.1 packaged as a setup.exe for Microsoft Windows Introduction This covers the three main mailing lists for the GNU Enterprise (http:// www.gnuenterprise.org) project, plus the #gnuenterprise IRC channel. 1. Impact of improving unicode support on other parts of GNUe 15 Aug 2003 Archive Link: "[IRC] 15 Aug 2003" Summary By Arturas Kriukovas Topics: Forms, Common People: Jan Ischebeck, Bajusz Tam?s Bajusz Tam?s (btami) asked Jan Ischebeck (siesel) about i18n (unicode default) changes to forms status. Jan said "its allmost ready, just some small parts still have to made ready f.e. the way database encodings are set." Jan still hadn't "worked on "unicodification" of GParser entities f.e. the "name" type should be converted to unicode, because it's used for labels etc" . Also, as he "was planning to commit some of the unicode changes to forms etc. Because common is changed to, some parts of reports possibly won't work as expected so it will be like the _() i18n changes i.e. there will be much to be fixed problems, which I can't check for, because I don't use reports regualary. I think, that now (after 0.5.1) is the time for changes like that, so I just want to ask if you have objections or what do you think about it." The changes basically should affect "the return type for strings is unicode instead of string when doing database access. It could made optional, so that f.e. gnue-pos can keep using normal string" . Jan promised to talk about this more later. 2. Licensing implications of writing applications in GNUe 18 Aug 2003 Archive Link: "[IRC] 18 Aug 2003" Summary By Peter Sullivan Topics: Why GNUe? People: Bajusz Tam?s, Reinhard M?ller, James Thompson, der.hans Bajusz Tam?s (btami) asked whether applications written with the GNUe tools would "have to be GPL-ed" (i.e. released under the GNU General Public License). Reinhard M?ller (reinhard) said "no - of course you would not even _want_ to write proprietary software - but if you really want, you can write prop software with gnue" . He explained "only the tools are gpl - so you have to provide the source for gnue-forms, gnue-common etc" . James Thompson (jamest) said "you can make prop forms, reports, etc - but you couldn't embed gnue-common in your app" . However, as Reinhard noted, in practice, "i don't see how you would hide the source of a form from your user ;-)" James suggested "i wonder if a person could do a pgp type setup w/ forms/reports/etc - so that forms could be encrypted w/ a private key - and the public key distributed with app" . Tam?s said that he personally would prefer to release applications he wrote under the GPL, but his company would need to be convinced of the benefits of this. Reinhard saud "the main benefit is getting back imporvements from the community" - "this is for example what i experienced with you last week with your fixes to appserver :)" Also, opening up the source reduced the reliance on key individuals - this was especially significant for smaller software houses. Also, "don't forget you don't have to open the source code to the world - you just have to open it to your customer - and let him open it to whomever he likes. Most customers will probably keep it to themselves anyway" . "The gpl doesn't say you have to give your code to anyone - you can keep it all for yourself if you like - but _when_ you give it away, you have to 1. give the source code, too 2. let the receiver give it to any 3rd persons he wants under the same conditions. So it might be totally normal to write code under gpl - and give it only to a single customer" . There was no requirement under GPL to make the source available to all and sundry, for example by putting it on an anonymous CVS service like savannah. der.hans (LuftHans) noted "also, technically you don't have to give the source code to your customers, you just have to make it available to them" . Reinhard agreed - "i provide a "written offer" myself instead of the source code" when installing Debian GNU/Linux for clients. 3. 0.5.1 packaged as a setup.exe for Microsoft Windows 19 Aug 2003 Archive Link: "[IRC] 19 Aug 2003" Summary By Peter Sullivan People: Bajusz Tam?s, James Thompson, Jason Cater, Jeff Bailey, Mike Vincent Bajusz Tam?s (btami) asked "what is the correct way if i fix a packaging error" for the stand-alone Windows 32 version of the GNUe Tools "and build a new setup exe?" James Thompson (jamest) suggested "gut tells me we should re-release w/ new point number - 0.5.2" . Jason Cater (jcater) was not so sure - "even if it's" just "a packaging error?" Tam?s confirmed "the designers toolbar wizards doesn't work in setup exe - just a packaging error" . Jeff Bailey (jbailey) suggested "add a .1 to the end." James felt "0.5.1.1 is fine too - but I think we need way to mark the diff" . Mike Vincent (Vee) suggested designating it as 0.5.1-1, but Jeff pointed out that "Versions with -'s are used by" GNU/Linux distributions such as Debian to signify different packages of the same underlying version of an application, "so unless all win32 versions are going to start -1, -2 for sub releases, it will just get confusing." . Sharon And Joy Kernel Traffic is grateful to be developed on a computer donated by Professor Greg Benson and Professor Allan Cruse in the Department of Computer Science at the University of San Francisco. This is the same department that invented FlashMob Computing. Kernel Traffic is hosted by the generous folks at kernel.org. All pages on this site are copyright their original authors, and distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2.0.