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From: kilgallen@eisner.decus.org (Larry Kilgallen)
Subject: Re: Wanted: Ada STL. Reward: Ada's Future
Date: 1999/02/05
Message-ID: <1999Feb5.113540.1@eisner>#1/1
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Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada
Date: 1999-02-05T00:00:00+00:00
List-Id: <comp.lang.ada>

In article <79dp2o$s2h$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, robert_dewar@my-dejanews.com writes:

> However, it is equally absurd to decide that because
> something is "free", you cannot use it in proprietary
> software.

And nobody said that it was impossible, so you erect
a paper tiger.  I said that it was too much trouble,
in the context of a discussion of somebody's class
library snippet.  It is different for something as
large as a compiler, where significant investment
in contract-reading may be warranted.  But for a
large number of items advertised as "free" (but
only under certain terms) in this newsgroup, the
effort outweighs the benefit.

The term "free" when used on code samples of this
size thus has all the significance of "coded by
left-handers" or "tested without using lab animals"
(as applied to software).

> I think you said commercial software in your
> software. (I think you said commercial software in your
> first message, but of course you meant proprietary
> software, this is a common confusion!)

If that is what I said, that is what I meant, as
the term "proprietary" has risen from non-use to
become an epithet used by advocates of "free"
software to describe anything that does not
claim to be "free".

This time I would invite _you_ to read Deja-News
for the past few years where you and I have had
this conversation, and not bore everyone else with
a replay.

Larry Kilgallen