* SGI GNAT Question? (Long) @ 1999-03-02 0:00 Paul Colvert 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar ` (2 more replies) 0 siblings, 3 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Paul Colvert @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) Greetings All! I have something of a mystery happening when using the GNAT Ada compiler (GNAT 3.11p) on a SGI Onyx. I was hoping that someone out there could enlighten me with this issue. I am sorry if this letter is somewhat long, but it was the best that I could do. Thanks. I have a simulation written in Ada95 that I am trying to build. My source code directory looks something like this: src/ ....common/ ...........common_files.ads ...........common_files.adb ....models/ ...........model_1/ ...................model_1.ads ...................model_1.adb ...........model_2/ ...................model_2.ads ...................model_2.adb ...........model_3/ ...................model_3.ads ...................model_3.adb ....linklib/ ............main_program_1.adb ............main_program_2.adb After successfully compiling the "common" source directory using this command: gcc -c -g -O0 -n32 /the.absolute.path/filename and each of the "models" source directories using this command: gcc -c -g -O0 -n32 -I/src/common /the.absolute.path/filename I successfully compile two different "mains" in the "linklib" source directory using this command: gcc -c -g -O0 -n32 \ -I/src/common \ -I/src/models/model_1 \ -I/src/models/model_2 \ -I/src/models/model_3 \ /the.absolute.path/filename At this point, I was able to bind and link the first "main" using the following commands: gnatbind -A -n32 \ -I/src/common \ -I/src/models/model_1 \ -I/src/models/model_2 \ -I/src/models/model_3 \ -I/src/linklib \ main_program_1.ali gnatlink -A -n32 -o main_program_1 main_program_1.ali But when I try to do the same thing with the second "main" using the same commands, the gnatlink command errors out saying that it could not find the file "common_files.ads". This appeared to be some kind of path problem. After some man page reading, I defined two environment variables, ADA_INCLUDE_PATH and ADA_OBJECTS_PATH, as this: ADA_INCLUDE_PATH=\ /src/linklib:\ /src/models/model_1:\ /src/models/model_2:\ /src/models/model_3:\ /src/common ADA_OBJECTS_PATH=\ /src/linklib:\ /src/models/model_1:\ /src/models/model_2:\ /src/models/model_3:\ /src/common Now, I am able to successfully bind and link both programs using the following commands: gnatbind -A -n32 main_program_1.ali gnatlink -A -n32 -o main_program_1 main_program_1.ali and gnatbind -A -n32 main_program_2.ali gnatlink -A -n32 -o main_program_2 main_program_2.ali Can anyone tell me why first method would work for one "main" but not the other? I know I can use the environment variable method, but I am really puzzled about the first method. Any help that could be offered would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! P.S. For those who may not know, the "-n32" option is a SGI specific ABI (Application Binary Interface). -- Paul Colvert colvert@ro.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-02 0:00 SGI GNAT Question? (Long) Paul Colvert @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-03 0:00 ` Paul Colvert 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Gautier 1999-03-02 0:00 ` David C. Hoos, Sr. 2 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bflkk$78i$1@news.ro.com>, colvert@ro.com wrote: > Greetings All! > > I have something of a mystery happening when using the > GNAT Ada compiler (GNAT 3.11p) on a SGI Onyx. I was > hoping that someone out there could enlighten me with > this issue. I am sorry if this letter is somewhat long, > but it was the best that I could do. Thanks. Please note that 3.11p does NOT support n32 mode. You may be able to get it to partially work, but you will definitely have problems. This option is not documented in the GNAT users guide for a good reason. If you need a version supporting n32 mode, contact your SGI sales person. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-03 0:00 ` Paul Colvert 1999-03-03 0:00 ` robert_dewar 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: Paul Colvert @ 1999-03-03 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) > > I have something of a mystery happening when using the > > GNAT Ada compiler (GNAT 3.11p) on a SGI Onyx. I was > > hoping that someone out there could enlighten me with > > this issue. I am sorry if this letter is somewhat long, > > but it was the best that I could do. Thanks. > > Please note that 3.11p does NOT support n32 mode. You may > be able to get it to partially work, but you will > definitely have problems. This option is not documented > in the GNAT users guide for a good reason. > > If you need a version supporting n32 mode, contact your > SGI sales person. > > Robert Dewar > Ada Core Technologies I am sorry if I was unclear about this. I am using the SGI Ada95 compiler (1.3?) which is based upon GNAT 3.11p compiler and does support the SGI "n32" ABI. -- Paul Colvert colvert@ro.com ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-03 0:00 ` Paul Colvert @ 1999-03-03 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-04 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-03 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bia5u$3lt$1@news.ro.com>, colvert@ro.com (Paul Colvert) wrote: > I am sorry if I was unclear about this. I am using the > SGI Ada95 compiler (1.3?) which is based upon GNAT 3.11p > compiler and does support the SGI "n32" ABI. Well that's not quite right, the SGI Ada 95 compiler (1.3) is based on 3.11b2, not on 3.11p (no commercial products from ACT or SGI are ever "based on" the public version). If indeed you are using the SGI 1.3 compiler, then you have support from SGI, so you should contact SGI for assistance. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-03 0:00 ` robert_dewar @ 1999-03-04 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 2 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-04 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) robert_dewar@my-dejanews.com wrote: > Well that's not quite right, the SGI Ada 95 compiler (1.3) > is based on 3.11b2, not on 3.11p (no commercial products > from ACT or SGI are ever "based on" the public version). > What is 3.11b2 "based" on ? what is its version history ? does its ancestor tree ever meet up with the "public" 3.11p version history ? is 3.11b2 GPL ? which came first the "public" GNAT compiler or the ACT commercial compiler ? Am I write in presuming that the commerical version came first, since if the GPL version came first, then commercial version being a modification would be covered by the GPL and anyone obtaining the 3.11b2 version would be free to re-distribute it provided they extended the same GPL rights to their distribution. Or did ACT develope two Ada95 compilers behind chinese walls ? ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-04 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dewar 1 sibling, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-04 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DE8585.2B5E6A5C@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > > Am I write in presuming that the commerical version came first, since if > the GPL version came first, then commercial version being a modification > would be covered by the GPL and anyone obtaining the 3.11b2 version would > be free to re-distribute it provided they extended the same GPL rights to > their distribution. Or did ACT develope two Ada95 compilers behind chinese > walls ? If you are asking if the compiler you have is covered by the GPL, that should be easy to determine from your distribution. Just check the licensing agreement! T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-04 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1 sibling, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-04 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DE8585.2B5E6A5C@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > What is 3.11b2 "based" on ? what is its version history ? > does its ancestor tree ever meet up with the "public" > 3.11p version history ? is 3.11b2 GPL ? which came first > the "public" GNAT compiler or the ACT commercial compiler As has been clearly stated before, 3.11p is derived from the commercial version 3.11b2, and yes, of course all ACT software is covered by the GPL. > Am I write in presuming that the commerical version came > first, since if the GPL version came first, then > commercial version being a modification would be covered > by the GPL You are a bit confused here. So let me once again state how we work at ACT. There are basically three kinds of versions of GNAT around. The Commercial versions (GNAT Professional) ------------------------------------------- The commercial versions, designated by letters like a/b/c. These are distributed to customers, and represent the versions that we fully support under support contracts. These are of course all under the GPL, or GNAT modified GPL, as appropriate (the modifications allow the runtime to be used with non-GPL'ed programs). Generally we prefer these not be further distributed by our customers because a) We don't want versions to be distributed publicly till they are in good shape and installation glitch free, since it will only be a nuisance for users with no access to support to be confronted with many versions of GNAT, some of which may have problems. This was for example the case with versions 3.11b and 3.11b1, which had some minor regressions that we cleared up before distributing 3.11b2. b) If a release is in good shape for distribution, we make a corresponding public release. In this case 3.11p is basically identical to 3.11b2. The Public Releases ------------------- THese are our full technology with no kinds of restrictions or limitations. We release public versions from time to time to correspond to stable customer releases of GNAT Professional. Note that we do not provide any kind of support for these versions, and furthermore, we do not make any claims (validation, Y2K, compliance) or anything else for the public versions. For one thing, we have no control over what happens to the public versions once they are released. The distinction in version numbers is helpful, because it makes clear what we support and what we do not support. The "p" versions are our full unrestricted technology, but they do not come with any kind of support from us. Nevertheless they have proved very helpful for student and research use. Wavefront "versions" -------------------- These are designated by a w after the version. They are based on our latest development sources, and have been verified to pass the ACT regression tests, DEC regression tests, and the ACVC tests, but have had no field testing. We make them available to our customers on an individual request basis when there is no other way to correct a current problem. Again, we note to our customers that it is not helpful to the community to distribute these wavefront versions, since they are definitely not in the same well-tested state as our major releases. Current State ------------- We have an internal 3.12 development version with lots of new exciting features, and a number of bug fixes. We expect to release 3.12a for field testing to our customers in the near future, and as soon as we have a stable version, a corresponding 3.12p will be released. Patches ------- There are a few fairly important patches to 3.11 technology that we have developed and are testing. We will release these in the very near future. One of particular interest is a patch to the 3.11p NT version that allows COM files to be built in a straightforward manner. Chinese Walls ------------- No such thing at ACT, the world of open source software does not need such things :-) Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-05 0:00 ` GNAT Field Test scope (was SGI GNAT Question) Larry Kilgallen ` (3 more replies) 0 siblings, 4 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) dewar@gnat.com wrote: > As has been clearly stated before, 3.11p is derived from > the commercial version 3.11b2, From later comments in your post re the interpretation of the letter versioning, you could go further and state that 3.11b2 "IS" 3.11p in source tree and binary build terms. except that the "b2" bit means that it is ACT supported, assuming that no-one has obtained a copy of 3.11b2 through a third-party exercising their right under the terms of the GPL and redistributing 3.11b2 in accordance with the terms of the GPL. > and yes, of course all ACT software is covered by the GPL. > Specifically, you have clarified that the commercial GNAT is GPL code, ACT irrespective of their commerical commitment to open source, are compelled by the terms of GPL to release any and ALL future versions of GNAT under the GPL whether they deem it a "commercial" or "public" release, and anyone has the right to redistribute whichever version under GPL terms. > > Am I write in presuming that the commerical version came > > first, since if the GPL version came first, then > > commercial version being a modification would be covered > > by the GPL > > You are a bit confused here. The confusion arises from repeated posts regarding different versions of GNAT, namely public and commercial, which lead me to believe that GNAT/ACT was a similar GPL model to the GHOSTSCRIPT/ALADDIN model, whereby there is a better version of the GPL ghostscript code available from aladdin for a fee that is not distributed under GPL. I believe this is possible because the origin code was not GPL, Aladdin just release older versions under the GPL as a "tempter" for anyone with a "newer" printer with unsupported drivers. Thankyou for the clarification, there is no better "stable" version of GNAT available than the public 3.11p, though commercial Ada projects using GNAT would benefit from support and that is solely available from ACT. > So let me once again state how > we work at ACT. > > Generally we prefer these [ commercial versions] not be further > distributed by > our customers because ... but it is their right under the terms of the GPL, by which ACT are allowed in the first instance to modify it. > a) We don't want versions to be distributed publicly till > they are in good shape and installation glitch free, Strange that you inflict your "Beta" versions exclusively on your paying customers. I think the success of open source has been based on public releases feeding back to the developers bug reports. Having run a GNU/linux system for 3 years, I like many others are use to "feature-rich" pre-releases. > Chinese Walls > ------------- > > No such thing at ACT, the world of open source software > does not need such things :-) Granted, GPL code does not need protecting from itself. Thank you for clearing up my misunderstanding, sorry if this is a rehash, I have previously search dejanews, the FAQ and ACT homepage for "commercial" "public" clarification of GNAT. I do feel that question 4.2.1 of the comp.lang.ada FAQ would benefit from the description of the versions offered, as while I wouldn't go so far as to say ACTs position as both commerical company and GPL code developer is unique in the GPL world, they are certainly in a minority of GPL developers. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* GNAT Field Test scope (was SGI GNAT Question) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison ` (2 subsequent siblings) 3 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DFA6FB.D3A2AD84@spam.com>, SpamSpamSpam <spam@spam.com> writes: > Strange that you inflict your "Beta" versions exclusively on your paying > customers. I think the success of open source has been based on public > releases feeding back to the developers bug reports. Having run a > GNU/linux system for 3 years, I like many others are use to "feature-rich" > pre-releases. Of course none of those paying customers need to use those field test versions, unless they are waiting for a particular fix. Having had the opportunity to field test various software for 20 years now, I know I only want to participate in such activities when there is a particular reason -- not just for general purposes. Field test is just a part of qualifying a new software release. In many cases internal target testing is more valuable. Of course ACT is accepting bug reports all the time, so they already have a lot of feedback from paying customers and others regarding the general state of affairs. Presumably they even build regression tests. Unless you see particular regressions that have been released in GNAT, it would seem they have enough field test sites already. Adding more sites could slow down the process, and if there is no benefit obtained there is no reason to do it. Larry Kilgallen ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-05 0:00 ` GNAT Field Test scope (was SGI GNAT Question) Larry Kilgallen @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar ` (2 more replies) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` bourguet 3 siblings, 3 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DFA6FB.D3A2AD84@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > dewar@gnat.com wrote: > > a) We don't want versions to be distributed publicly till > > they are in good shape and installation glitch free, > > Strange that you inflict your "Beta" versions exclusively on your paying > customers. I think the success of open source has been based on public > releases feeding back to the developers bug reports. Having run a > GNU/linux system for 3 years, I like many others are use to "feature-rich" > pre-releases. ACT's position seems to be that the "public" versions are suitable for use only by students and hobbyists. If you are trying to do serious work with it, well that's horrifying, but hey, its your funeral. The implication in that attitude is that publicly released OpenSource software is unsuitable, even dangerous for use in a production environment. It seems to me that this is antithetical to the evolving vision of OpenSource software. The power in an OpenSource product is in the userbase, not the company behind it. Doing anything to discourage use of the software by prospective users is tantamount to slitting your own throat. The company I work for makes no secret of using all sorts of "unsupported" Open Source tools (gcc, emacs, perl, tk/tcl etc), and apparently makes a pretty good living for itself doing so. I suspect you'd probably be hard-pressed to find a fourune 100 company that *didn't* have someone using a public version of one of those tools to do production development. Generally the support you get from fellow users on usenet is far superior to what any company could provide. And in a real pinch, you can go into the source and fix a problem yourself. If we do *need* guaranteed support from experts for a particular project we would be happy to pay for it. T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-08 0:00 ` Marin David Condic 2 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bov12$r8o$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dennison@telepath.com wrote: > The company I work for makes no secret of using all sorts > of "unsupported" Open Source tools (gcc, emacs, perl, > tk/tcl etc), and apparently makes a pretty good living > for itself doing so. I suspect you'd probably be > hard-pressed to find a fourune 100 company that *didn't* > have someone using a public version of one of those tools > to do production development. Whether you find it useful to use unsupported software depends on your circumstances. Our policy at ACT is not to use unsupported software for any critical purposes, and that is the advice we pass on to our customers. > Generally the support you get from fellow users on usenet > is far superior to what any company could provide. That may be true in general, but certainly our customers do not consider it is true for the support that ACT provides which is certainly NOT what is generally typical in the field. Most certainly Ted cannot make a relevant judgment here since he does not have ACT support. We have certainly seen a number of occasions on which Ted has been frustrated to run into problems that would have been solved immediately if he had support. It all depends on how you value your time, and how much of a problem it is if you run into a blocking problem. > And in > a real pinch, you can go into the source and fix a > problem yourself. That's not really true, not "in a real pinch". Yes it is certainly true that you can support GNAT yourself, and indeed this possibility is important to many of our customers. But there is a learning curve here, and you need people who have some real knowledge of the GNAT sources. The scenario where you run into a problem, and then quick, in emergency mode burrow into the sources. Furthermore if you are selling this as a kind of insurance policy to your management, it is bogus, given the need to ramp up in people and experience before you could effectively solve the problem. Sure there may be limited cases in which this case be done, and often customers for example make fixes or modifications to run time units, but digging into the visibility circuits of the compiler to figure out if a puzzling error message is in fact a bug in GNAT or is a user error, and then fixing it in the former case is not something you can reasonably expect to do in an emergency. > If we do *need* guaranteed support from experts for a > particular project we would be happy to pay for it. Of course one of the things here is that you don't really know whether support would benefit you without trying it out. This is why we discourage people from using the public version of GNAT for evaluation. Instead, get an evaluation contract from us, and evaluate for yourselves how useful support can be. A very large part of our support consists in helping people with problems in their understanding of Ada or GNAT, or how best to use these technologies. We also help people find bugs in their programs in many cases as part of sorting out what is going on. I often see people flailing around on CLA, or chat@gnat.com looking for help on problems that I am certain would be solved quickly by our appropriate expert if they had an ACT support contract. As I say, it all depends on your requirements and needs, and on how valuable your time is. What we often see is serious projects trying to use GNAT without support getting into a mess, and then deciding that the mess means there is a problem with GNAT. Well that may be true in some cases, but nearly always the problems could be eliminated or at least managed in the context of proper support. That's why our position is that basically the public version of GNAT is intended for student and research use. If others find it useful fine, but that is not the audience we are catering to with the public releases. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-08 0:00 ` Marin David Condic 2 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: root @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) dennison@telepath.com wrote: > > ACT's position seems to be that the "public" versions are suitable for use > only by students and hobbyists. If you are trying to do serious work with it, > well that's horrifying, but hey, its your funeral. > > The implication in that attitude is that publicly released OpenSource > software is unsuitable, even dangerous for use in a production environment. Can we take a reality check here, ALL versions of GNAT are public! sure ACT can call different versions "commercial" or "public" and charge a "support" fee to provide you with a copy but you have the right to redistribute them under the GPL. There should be no difference between 3.11b2 and 3.11p ( okay, bar the version printing header ) and if there is (?), someone who works for a company who have bought 3.11b2, should do the honourable, get permission from their company and post it to alt.binaries.source. if you're over 18 see the source header and send to root. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36E2531E.37AEECF1@chocolatesaltyballs.com>, root <white@chocolatesaltyballs.com> wrote: > someone who works for a company who have bought 3.11b2, > should do the honourable, get permission from their > company and post it to alt.binaries.source. In fact 3.11p and 3.11b2 are indeed virtually identical (differing only in stuff related to the version name. When we make public releases they are not somehow crippled or incomplete, they are the full code at the time of release. As to whether it is viable for serious mission critical projects to use unsupported software, that is something that the project has to decide for itself. Our viewpoint that the public version is more suited to student and research use is an issue of support not bits! It is true that some of our supported customers are using more advanced versions of GNAT technology that is in alpha or beta testing status. We generally ask that such test versions NOT be distributed, since it definitely is NOT helpful to have dozens of slightly different versions of GNAT around, which have not been fully tested. It would not be illegal for a company to distribute a test version in this situation, but it would be unhelpful to the community, and I doubt "honorable" would be the right term for this :-) In fact this is an old practice in the open source community, and is used everywhere. For example, some of Cygnus' customers have access to Cygnus internal developments which are beyond the EGCS development, but they are in a stage where it is not helpful to generally distribute them, since work is needed to integrate them into the current EGCS sources. Cygnus will do this work in due course, so this technology will become available. Richard Stallman has been quite comfortable with this kind of request and understanding, and the FSF has often operated this way in the past, and it has worked out well. Hackers and hobbyists are often in a mode where they want the latest and greatest whether or not it is fully tested and working, and that is understandable. However, one of the great fears that the "real world" has of free/open source software is that it is out of control, and that it is a free for all where no one knows what version they have of anything or what's in it. In actual fact, the important developments in open source software (EMACS, GCC, GDB, LINUX, GNAT etc) are in fact managed in a much more responsible way, and there are stable well tested periodic releases, in much the same manner as for proprietary software (well I think we do a little better than Microsoft in getting out new versions of GNAT :-) P.S. GNAT 3.12 technology is on the way. We have most of the work done for this new release, which has many new interesting capabilities, and we are working towards an early release, which will include a public version 3.12p. We have no definite schedule yet, but we can say that the wait for 3.12p will be much shorter than the 3.10p to 3.11p gap (which was too long and too big a jump!) Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies P.S. It's interesting, we have variations on this thread every now and then, typically sparked by a new GNAT enthusiast who was not around for the old threads. Never mind, it is a good opportunity to sort out confusions with the GPL. One of the important accomplishments of the last few years is that now almost all major companies are MUCH more comfortable using open source software than they used to be! -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root @ 1999-03-08 0:00 ` Marin David Condic 2 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Marin David Condic @ 1999-03-08 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) dennison@telepath.com wrote: > > The implication in that attitude is that publicly released OpenSource > software is unsuitable, even dangerous for use in a production environment. > It seems to me that this is antithetical to the evolving vision of OpenSource > software. The power in an OpenSource product is in the userbase, not the > company behind it. Doing anything to discourage use of the software by > prospective users is tantamount to slitting your own throat. > Actually, I think it is a very clever marketing strategy and one in which both the supplier and the end user win. Think about it in this light: 15 years ago, if you wanted to have an Ada compiler, you had to shell out some serious cash and what you got was pretty crappy stuff. This put Ada beyond the hobbyist, student, small start-up venture, corporate hacker/developer (someone who may want to use it for non-critical software, but can't persuade his boss to buy it for him.) and others for whom the price was not practical. As a result, Ada languished & never got the audience it deserved. Even its fans were discouraged from using it. Did this help the compiler vendor? Did it help the end user? I think everybody wins with the OpenSource model - even if there are risks. As to a public release being "unsuitable" for development - well if I was building embedded engine controls with the compiler or some other mission critical software or even some internal tools the success of which were critical to the business, I'd buy the support because I need the risk reduction. Cost of failure far exceeds cost of the support. So I couldn't hardly fault someone at ACT for saying "caveat emptor" and not recommending GNAT-sans-support for critical projects. The question is how much risk are you willing to take and if you run into a bug that halts your efforts are you willing to say "well, that's the chance I took..."? I doubt warning somebody of this fact would hurt the product any more than when someone is selling you fire insurance for your house. Yes, once in a while they burn down and the loss is horendous if you don't have insurance - but that doesn't hurt the home sales market much. MDC -- Marin David Condic Real Time & Embedded Systems, Propulsion Systems Analysis United Technologies, Pratt & Whitney, Large Military Engines M/S 731-95, P.O.B. 109600, West Palm Beach, FL, 33410-9600 ***To reply, remove "bogon" from the domain name.*** "Don't say yes until I finish talking." -- Darryl F. Zanuck ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-05 0:00 ` GNAT Field Test scope (was SGI GNAT Question) Larry Kilgallen 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` bourguet 3 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DFA6FB.D3A2AD84@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > dewar@gnat.com wrote: > From later comments in your post re the interpretation of > the letter versioning, you could go further and state > that 3.11b2 "IS" 3.11p in source tree and binary build > terms. No, we would not go further and make any such statement. We make no statements at all about the 3.11p version, since we have no control over it once it is out there. We only make guarantees with respect to our supported commercial technologies. Clearly the source tree is NOT identical, it is at the least different with respect to the version number embedded into the source at several points. The most we will say is that 3.11p is based on 3.11b2. > Specifically, you have clarified that the commercial GNAT > is GPL code, ACT irrespective of their commerical > commitment to open source, are compelled by the terms of > GPL to release any and ALL future versions of GNAT under > the GPL This is quite wrong in two important respects. The GPL never forces anyone to release anything. If ACT decided that all future versions of GNAT will be private to ACT and used only within ACT, that would be completely consistent with the GPL. Similarly, if ACT decided that future versions of the ACT copyrighted components of GNAT were to be released in fully proprietary form, that would be perfectly consistent. Giving someone a license to your copyrighted creation does not place limitations on YOU, the author! These are indeed common misconceptions. In particular, I have talked with several companies recently who were quite surprised to find that they could do the following: 1. Issue an open source version of software X under GPL 2. Issue a deriviative work that was fully proprietary FOr example, you could have a crippleware product that was under the GPL, and the fancy version with bells and whistles as fully proprietary. Cygnus does something a little like this with Cygwin. The public version is under the strict GPL, which means that it CANNOT be incorporated into proprietary programs. If you want this kind of incorporation you have to buy their proprietary version, which, to a first degree of approximation, is identical except for the license. This is perfectly legitimate. In fact ACT is committed to making future versions of our technology publicly released under the GPL or GNAT-modified GPL (GGPL) as appropriate, but this is a result of corporate policy, there is nothing in the GPL that requires this. Here are two useful things to remember: The GPL NEVER requires anyone to distribute a program under ANY circumstances at ANY time. It does place restrictions on you if YOU choose to distribute. The GPL is just a license. Open source software under the GPL is like any other software on the market. It is copyrighted software to which you are granted a limited license. Granting a license to people in no way restricts the copyright holder's ability to do anything they like with their own work. > Strange that you inflict your "Beta" versions exclusively > on your paying customers. I think the success of open > source has been based on public releases feeding back to > the developers bug reports. Not so strange. Beta versions of this type are given only to customers who request them, and who have full support should they run into any problems. That makes a big difference. What may be a small installation glitch in a version given to a customer, where the problem can be solved instantly under their support contract, may be a big problem for a general public release. The criteria for a public release, to be used by lots of people with no support are different. > Having run a GNU/linux system for 3 years, I like many > others are use to "feature-rich" pre-releases. More than you think, development of GNU and Linux software happens on private trees that do not begin to be public. In fact they are private enough that often people are not aware of them. I often meet people who think that EGCS is the Cygnus development tree. In fact of course it is not, there are major developments going on internally in Cygnus which they do not tell the outside world about. The difference with ACT is that we tell people what is going on, and share our future plans much more openly. But no major open source development that I know of is much different. There is a public version that represents technology that is one step behind the current development technology. In this respect open source software is really very little different from normal proprietary software. The other point here is that the public releases of GNAT are quite conciously aimed at the large mass of Ada users, NOT at hobbyists and enthusiasts who want to fiddle around. That creates a rather different market place. By far the most common use of GNAT is by beginning students, and the requirements here are quite different from those of many CLA readers :-) > As while I wouldn't go so far as to say ACTs position as > both commerical company and GPL code developer is unique > in the GPL world, they are certainly in a minority of GPL > developers. If you think that, it is probably because you do not know what is really going on! It would certainly be nice to see more activity in the publicly released tree. ACT itself does not have the resources to support the kind of active integration of changes that we see with EGCS (Cygnus budgets a substantial amount of resources for this purpose). Marcus Kuhn and others are trying to setup a similar environment for GNAT on a volunteer basis, and in addition, the GNAT front end will be integrated on some basis into EGCS (we are still discussing with the EGCS folk how to do this effectively). But not all GPL products have such an active public tree by any means. For example, GDB does not, and this is quite a problem, because, unlike the case with GNAT, there are several major companies doing major work on GDB, and there is no effective way to coordinate that work at the moment. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` robert_dewar 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bos1q$ogq$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dewar@gnat.com wrote: > Similarly, if ACT decided that future versions of the ACT > copyrighted components of GNAT were to be released in > fully proprietary form, that would be perfectly > consistent. Giving someone a license to your copyrighted > creation does not place limitations on YOU, the author! Whoa! I have to admit I missed that one entirely. I guess its a good thing I'm an engineer instead of a laywer. T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bp6pv$2mm$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dennison@telepath.com wrote: > In article <7bos1q$ogq$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, > dewar@gnat.com wrote: > > > Similarly, if ACT decided that future versions of the > > ACT copyrighted components of GNAT were to be > > released in fully proprietary form, that would be > > perfectly consistent. Giving someone a license to > > your copyrighted creation does not place limitations > > on YOU, the author! > > Whoa! I have to admit I missed that one entirely. I guess > its a good thing I'm an engineer instead of a laywer. But if you "missed that one entirely", it means you have some strange peculiar view of the GPL (a not uncommon phenomenon :-) If I own a program, and I license you to use it, it is very hard for me to see why you think that the license I give to you would stop me from doing what I like with the program. I am not transferring the rights in the program to you, just licensing it. When you get a licensed product from Microsoft, you know perfectly well that they still own the program and can do anything they like with it. Well there is *nothing* unusual about the GPL in this regard, it is simply a limited license giving the recipient of the license certain limited rights to use the copyrighted works. As with any license of this kind, certain uses are permitted, and certain ones are forbidden. Yes, the GPL is certainly more liberal in what it lets you do than Microsoft's license, but that does not affect the basic structure of the situation from a legal point of view. I often find that people, including attorneys sometimes, have strange ideas about the GPL. Once they realize that it is just a normal situation of a copyrighted work being distributed under license it is much easier to understand. Of course they can still be a bit puzzled with a license whose language seems more intent on telling you all the things you *can* do, rather than working hard to tell you all the things you *cannot* do, and they may be even more surprised if you tell them you paid nothing for the license, but that is commercial rather than legal surprise :-) -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` robert_dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` David Botton 0 siblings, 2 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: root @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) robert_dewar@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > In article <7bp6pv$2mm$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, > dennison@telepath.com wrote: > > In article <7bos1q$ogq$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, > > dewar@gnat.com wrote: > > > > > Similarly, if ACT decided that future versions of the > > > ACT copyrighted components of GNAT were to be > > > released in fully proprietary form, that would be > > > perfectly consistent. Giving someone a license to > > > your copyrighted creation does not place limitations > > > on YOU, the author! > > > > Whoa! I have to admit I missed that one entirely. I guess > > its a good thing I'm an engineer instead of a laywer. > > But if you "missed that one entirely", it means you have > some strange peculiar view of the GPL (a not uncommon > phenomenon :-) > > If I own a program, and I license you to use it, it is > very hard for me to see why you think that the license > I give to you would stop me from doing what I like with > the program. I am not transferring the rights in the > program to you, just licensing it. Note the use of the "if" at the start. Are you claiming literal ownership of GNAT? what do your fellow contributors ( from your mates(?) at NY to joe bloggs on the street who sent in a GPL bug fix to a GPL source ) say to that? Are they they ALL in unison ? because if one of those contributors says NO, end of story. What would the original US government dept that sponsored the development of a "free" compiler say to that? If I or anyone who came by the GNAT source through the GPL modified it and released it to others it would have to be GPL as stated in section 4 and 5. What you are saying is that you never can by the source through the GPL, therefore you are not covered by it. Interesting point, but it only takes one other contributor to say that their code fix which you incorporated was released under the GPL for you to be bound by it.. so get real. ALL versions of GNAT are GPL and they always will be, Richard Stallman probably has a quad of legal cash waiting for the first commercial enterprise to abuse the GPL, as that would set the precedent. You can no more take GNAT back, that Larry Walls, Linus Torvalds and Richard Stallman could take back perl, linux, or emacs. > When you get a licensed product from Microsoft, you know > perfectly well that they still own the program and can do > anything they like with it. So you have to use Microsoft as an example to make yourself look good in the GPL world ? > Well there is *nothing* unusual about the GPL in this > regard, it is simply a limited license giving the recipient > of the license certain limited rights to use the > copyrighted works. The terms copyleft, and its simply a licence as a Rolls Royce and a Lada are cars. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-08 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` David Botton 1 sibling, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36E25778.C056829@chocolatesaltyballs.com>, root <white@chocolatesaltyballs.com> wrote: Well a lot of confusion and misunderstanding here, so it is a useful opportunity to clarify things: > Note the use of the "if" at the start. Are you claiming > literal ownership of GNAT? what do your fellow > contributors ( from your mates(?) at NY to joe bloggs on > the street who sent in a GPL bug fix to a GPL source ) > say to that? Are they they ALL in unison ? The copyright for each part of the GNAT system is no secret. You can find it in the appropriate unit in the sources. There are basically the following copyrights around: 1. Copyrights that have been assigned to the FSF by NYU for the original work done at NYU (by the way almost everyone on the NYU team now works full time for ACT!) This was done by a normal FSF assignment. As always with the assignment document, the original assignee retains an unlimited license to do anything they want with the program, but that license rests with NYU, and they are unlikely to excercise it. 2. Copyrights that have been assigned to FSF by ACT for follow on work. Obviously we could use our own copyright for fixes and improvements to the basic GNAT modules, but we choose not to, because it is our corporate policy that all FSF copyrighted units continue to have the full FSF copyright (see more discusssion below). 3. Copyrights that ACT holds. These are used for major components developed after the NYU contract, some examples are the SPITBOL routines in the GNAT library, and the JGNAT backend. ACT is commited to releasing these components under the GPL including future versions, but as I have pointed out, this is a function of corporate policy, not of the legal requirements of the GPL. 4. Copyrights held by third paries. Examples are the tasking units which have an FSU copyright. These are all covered by the GPL, and that is the basis on which ACT uses these units. We intend to continue to provide them in GPL'ed form, but of course the third party copyright holders could excercise their rights to make non-GPL'ed versions in the future. > because if one of those contributors says NO, end of > story. Well it is worse than this if you think about it. What if someone makes a fix that is not under the GPL, then you have a deriviative work that cannot be distributed without the explicit permission of both copyright holders (because of course the GPL one one part does not permit you to distribute other things not covered by the GPL). Note that in this case the holder of the copyright on the non-GPL'ed modification cannot distribute the combined work, since the GPL prevents this. What the FSF does, and what we do, is to accept changes only if the copyright situation is dealt with satisfactorily. There are various possibilities here 1. Small fixes are considered de minimis and non-copyrightable. A usual standard has been that anything up to ten lines is covered by this (this is the standard that for example gcc has used). We prefer to treat even small changes as in para 2 following where possible, but certainly if someone points out that a word is wrongly spelled in the documentation, they do not have an enforcable copyright interest in the correct spelling :-) 2. Larger contributions must involve either an assignment of copyright, or a waiver of copyright interest. At ACT, we have a large file of such waivers on hand, and that is a normal procedure for the maintenance of GPL'ed software. It is just not feasible to have a single file in which many different people have a legal copyright interest. 3. Public domain work of any kind is of course not a problem. Essentially this is work for which the author has in advance issued a waiver. 4. Completely separate units can be incorporated into GNAT with the original author's copyright where appropriate. > What would the original US government dept that sponsored > the development of a "free" compiler say to that? The contract with the US government had two requirements: 1. All units were to be released under the GPL or LGPL (we later decided on the more permissive GNAT modified GPL for the latter purpose). 2. All copyrights were to be assigned to the FSF Most certainly the original US government dept that sponsored GNAT has no control or say in what happens at this stage. The contract was completed, and the conditions of the contract were met to the satisfaction of the government auditors. If ACT or some other entity had decided to maintain GNAT on a proprietary basis (the GPL makes this trickier but by no means impossible), then that would have been too bad but not a contract violation. Really what I am stressing here is that neither the GPL nor the expired government contract require that GNAT be handled in a completely open manner (e.g. that public releases continue to be made). This is a function of clearly stated ACT policy. I constantly run into people who think that ACT is somehow, by someone, or something, *required* to make public releases of GNAT. But this is definitely not the case, it is something we are committed to do, because we feel it is an important contribution to the Ada community. The ACT policy here has been absolutely clear from the start, and I will restate it again, so there can be no confusion: "It is the policy of Ada Core Technologies, and ACT/EUrope, that GNAT and its associated tool set will continue to be distributed under the GPL (or GGPL) and that public versions will be released from time to time that reflect the complete state of the technology in open source form." > If I or anyone who came by the GNAT source through the > GPL modified it and released it to others it would have > to be GPL as stated in section 4 and 5. If you have a legitimate license (the GPL in this case), you can certainly modify it and distribute the modification in any form allowed by the GPL (your modification does not have to be under the GPL, it can be under a more liberal license, e.g. be in the public domain, that is up to you). For ACT to incorporate this change into the mainstream sources, the copyright issue would have to be resolved as described above. > What you are saying is that you never can by the source > through the GPL therefore you are not covered by it. > Interesting point. No no, that's not quite right. The *copyright holder* does not need a license to use their own stuff. They can do anything they like. In the case of ACT, we definitely need a license to use other people's copyrighted software: 1. The components where the FSF holds the copyright 2. The components where some third party (e.g. FSU) holds the copyright and we rely on the GPL for this access. For units to which ACT holds the copyright, we certainly need no license at all! > but it only takes one other contributor to say that their > code fix which you incorporated was released under the > GPL for you to be bound by it. As I made clear above, we would never incorporate changes without resolving the copyright issue as above. Note that in the case of assignments, we would use the FSF assignment form which is an unusual one, because it constrains the recipient of the assignment to continue distribution under the GPL. Suppose for example, you right some GPL'ed unit, you then assign the copyright in the normal manner to IBM. They then make a proprietary version, which they hold the copyright to, and refuse to license it, even to you. Sound unfair? Yup, but this kind of assignment is not uncommon (most authors have to execute such assignments to their publishers for example). The FSF assignment, which ACT would also use, has two important extra conditions: 1. It constrains the assignee (FSF or ACT) to always release future modifications and versions under the GPL. 2. It grants an unlimited license back to the assignor > ALL versions of GNAT are GPL and they always will be, > Richard Stallman probably has a quad of legal cash > waiting for the first commercial enterprise to abuse the > GPL, as that would set the precedent. Richard Stallman would only have legal standing if we did something inappropriate with an FSF copyrighted component, and even there it would not be Richard Stallman, but rather the FSF that had standing. The GPL itself is a license which is a contract between two parties. There are only two kinds of legal redress available, violations of the contract under contract law, which of course can only involve the parties to the contract, and copyright violations, which can only involve the copyright holder. If FSF is neither a party to the contract, nor the copyright holder, then they are not an interested party. Richard Stallman might or might not give his opinion on the appropriate interpretation of the GPL, and might for example be an expert witness on one side or the other in any legal proceeding, but would not otherwise have standing. I often find this is a confusion, people somehow think that any instance of the GPL involves the FSF. This of course is not the case. The GPL is just a license which anyone is free to use in any situation they like. > You can no more take GNAT back, that Larry Walls, Linus > Torvalds and Richard Stallman could take back perl, > linux, or emacs. Well you are probably right from a practical point of view, but the point is that nothing would legally prevent these authors from trying to make a proprietary version of their work. Surely they would fail in the attempt. > > When you get a licensed product from Microsoft, you > > know perfectly well that they still own the program and > > can do anything they like with it. > > So you have to use Microsoft as an example to make > yourself look good in the GPL world ? That's an odd statement. This has nothing to do with looking good, it has to do with legal requirements of the GPL, which is what we are discussing. The point here is that historically, lawyers for large companies have often been very suspicious of the GPL, because they think something funny is going on (indeed this message which I am responding too makes an attempt to reinforce this incorrect viewpoint). Realizing that the GPL is just a license, no different in fundamental legal structure form the licenses that Microsoft grants is very helpful, because it makes large companies see that there is nothing to be afraid of in using GPL'ed software. We have spent a lot of time working with large companies to alleviate concerns of this kind. > > Well there is *nothing* unusual about the GPL in this > > regard, it is simply a limited license giving the > > recipient of the license certain limited rights to use > > the copyrighted works. > The terms copyleft Actually this is not a technical term, but just a popular one. It is probably unfortunate since it has tended to create the impression that GPL'ed software is not copyrighted, but rather exists in some strange legal state different from copyright. Note that the GPL itself (quite deliberately) does NOT use the term copyleft. > and its simply a licence as a Rolls Royce and a Lada > are cars. Now *there* we can agree. The Rolls Royce and the Lada are of course just cars, but they are cars you would like to have if you have the choice. The GPL is indeed a Rolls-Royce of licenses from the point of view of the licensor, and helping companies to realize that this is the case, and helping them to realize that the GPL is highly desirable from their point of view is what this is all about. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-08 0:00 ` root 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dewar 0 siblings, 2 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: root @ 1999-03-08 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) [-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1 bytes --] [-- Attachment #2: Document.txt --] [-- Type: text/plain, Size: 8901 bytes --] >In article <36E25778.C056829@chocolatesaltyballs.com>, > root <white@chocolatesaltyballs.com> wrote: > >Well a lot of confusion and misunderstanding here, so it >is a useful opportunity to clarify things: Well, obviously a statement intended to dumb down, assume the high ground and set things up nicely for what's to follow.... >> because if one of those contributors says NO, end of >> story. > >Well it is worse than this if you think about it. >What if >someone makes a fix that is not under the GPL, then you >have a derivative work that cannot be distributed without >the explicit permission of both copyright holders (because >of course the GPL one one part does not permit you to >distribute other things not covered by the GPL). Note that >in this case the holder of the copyright on the non-GPL'ed >modification cannot distribute the combined work, since >the GPL prevents this. This example is plain wrong. The person can't "fix" a GPL work unless the person agrees to the GPL terms (section 5). So " a fix that is not under the GPL" is just not going to see the light of day! 5. You are not required to accept this License, since you have not signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying the Program or works based on it. And once the person accept the GPL terms they can't release it to others under any licence more restrictive than the GPL (end para of section 2.) "...when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it." ACT has copyright on parts of GNAT. I take your point that ACT is not bound by the GPL on those parts, however many other people/organisations have contributed to GNAT and the GPL is there to make sure that such works are not made proprietary. >If ACT or some other entity had decided to maintain GNAT >on a proprietary basis (the GPL makes this trickier but >by no means impossible), then that would have been too bad >but not a contract violation. The only way you could have done this was to have exclusive copyright on the whole of GNAT. This IS an insight for me, thank you, however you don't, so you can't, so stop saying you could. (just thought! or gain exclusive copyright via purchase of the copyright from all the other parties of the GNAT version who's upgrade is to be made proprietary ! I wonder if Microsoft are about to make Linus and his mates an offer they can't refuse?!? ) >I constantly run into people who think that ACT is somehow, >by someone, or something, *required* to make public Never said you were required to release, just said if you did it would have to be GPL, and until you buy copyright ownership of the complete source tree it stays that way (although this wasn't my origin premise). >"It is the policy of Ada Core Technologies, and ACT/EUrope, >that GNAT and its associated tool set will continue to be >distributed under the GPL (or GGPL) and that public >versions will be released from time to time that reflect >the complete state of the technology in open source form." This is the crux, the commercial versions are as "public" as the public versions, they are as public as they are ever going to be. They are GPL :) the technology is already open source. While I don't agree with your alpha/beta testing policy (it's your funeral to think you wouldn't get there quicker with an open daily CVS). To release a stable version and not at the same time release the functional identical public version is not in the spirit of the GPL. Which you haven't done yet, so I'm not accusing. Don't get offended either, you leave yourself open to such cynicism, with two GPL releases, one of which is called commercial with implied functional difference, that only paying customers can independently verify. >> If I or anyone who came by the GNAT source through the >> GPL modified it and released it to others it would have >> to be GPL as stated in section 4 and 5. > >If you have a legitimate license (the GPL in this case), >you can certainly modify it and distribute the modification >in any form allowed by the GPL (your modification does not >have to be under the GPL, it can be under a more liberal >license, e.g. be in the public domain, that is up to you). Sorry but you've just quoted me and then repeated me! (Although its section 2 not 4). Anything more relaxed is virtually giving it away without licence, anything more restrictive is prohibited by the GPL. I.e. either give it away, and forget licence discussion or release it under the GPL. >> What you are saying is that you never can[came] by the source >> through the GPL therefore you are not covered by it. >> Interesting point. > >No no, that's not quite right. The *copyright holder* does >not need a license to use their own stuff. They can do >anything they like. In the case of ACT, we definitely need >a license to use other people's copyrighted software: Gratefully noted. An insight into GPL workings, and a GPL work made of many different copyrights :) >Suppose for example, you right some GPL'ed unit, you then >assign the copyright in the normal manner to IBM. They then >make a proprietary version, which they hold the copyright >to, and refuse to license it, even to you. Sound unfair? Definitively, which is a good reason to keep your copyright and not sign it over to a commercial interest like ACT for example. ACT can become IBM-ACT overnight if the price is right. Yes, you've stated you're a private company, so hostile takeover of ACT is improbably, but who knows what the commercial future for an Ada compiler vendor/support company is (Rosy I hope :). >I often find this is a confusion, people somehow think that >any instance of the GPL involves the FSF. This of course >is not the case. The GPL is just a license which anyone >is free to use in any situation they like. No! I'm not confused. I'm just envisaging a situation where some commercial interest abuses the GPL, who's going to defend the GPL work? It would fall to the FSF/Richard Stallman to pick the flag up. If I wrote some work, placed it under the GPL and had it ripped by Microsoft, the most I could do would be to report it to FSF/Richard Stallman, the flag bearers of the licence, and they'd definitely be interested because of precedence. >> You can no more take GNAT back, that Larry Walls, Linus >> Torvalds and Richard Stallman could take back perl, >> linux, or emacs. > >Well you are probably right from a practical point of view, >but the point is that nothing would legally prevent these >authors from trying to make a proprietary version of their >work. Surely they would fail in the attempt. Thanks for one concession. ACT could say tomorrow "it is our commercial policy to nolonger release future versions of GNAT under the GPL", and they'd fail, because of the GPL, because that's its intent. >> The terms copyleft > >Actually this is not a technical term, but just a popular >one. It is probably unfortunate since it has tended to >create the impression that GPL'ed software is not >copyrighted, but rather exists in some strange legal >state different from copyright. Note that the GPL itself >(quite deliberately) does NOT use the term copyleft. Yes. I should have known better than to use the term "copyleft" when talking re lawfully binding licence. I was trying to rise above the strict interpretation of the GPL, to highlight the intent. >The GPL is indeed a Rolls-Royce of licenses from the point >of view of the licensor, and helping companies to realize >that this is the case, and helping them to realize that >the GPL is highly desirable from their point of view is >what this is all about. That might be your goal, but mine was just to determine that GNAT is and all future versions will always be GPL open source. The dangers of an individual or organisation's copyright remaining within the GPL is a good argument for having more than one party involved in development, if it is truly open source and others are contributing their efforts. I can't predict the future, no more than you, but I would wager that the day GNAT has a single copyright source of ACT, is the day everyone has to pay for a new version (and not just the cost of making the CD). You can disagree and almost certainly will, it's just my view and that's my right. I shall watch the percentage of ACT copyright notices in GNAT with interest. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-08 0:00 ` root @ 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison ` (2 more replies) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dewar 1 sibling, 3 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-09 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) Incidentally a bit of history may provide useful perspective here. I know that many readers are fully familiar with this, but we always have new readers who have discovered Ada more recently who don't always know the history (and of course it is great to see new people coming into the Ada fold). I personally have fought the fight to get open source software out for Ada from the start, well starting in the early 80's. At NYU, we wrote NYU Ada/Ed, the first validated Ada translator first in SETL, and then later translated into C. We had a big struggle to get the sources of this out. The DoD which was funding as at the time retained some data rights and wanted to try to make money (more accurately to get some of the money they had spent back) by selling the program through the national technical information service. Eventually we did succeed in releasing the sources, but it was really too late to be useful. Later in the 80's I made several trips down to Washington trying to interest DARPA in funding a free software Ada 83 compiler. I got some expression of interest, but basically DARPA was not that interested in Ada, and things never got anywhere. I considered it crucial for Ada's long term success that we have open source versions available for use in universities, but until Ada 95 came along I just could not convince anyone else that this was important. I spread the gospel of the importance of a free software approach to Ada 95 to Chris Anderson, and from my input, and from the input of many others, it was Chris who was finally persuaded that this made sense. The contract between the DoD and NYU for GNAT was rather amazing. Following my specific recommendations, it required the use of the GPL and LGPL (and indeed the entire text of the GPL is in the contract), and it also requires assignment of the copyright to FSF (I explained at the time why I thought it was important to get the copyright free of NYU, since some people at NYU, as at any other university, are more interested in making money off patents and copyrighted software than in promulgating free software. I knew that an assignment to the FSF would protect the continued free status, whatever NYU decided it wanted to do.) That's a rather *amazing* contract, and in retrospect, Chris was surprised that she succeeded in getting it past the legal and procurement scrutiny in the DoD. In fact I think it is a tremendous achievment, and I am not sure anyone else other than Chris could have managed it. The next big hurdle was the other Ada vendors. Chris thought they would be pleased at this development since it was clear to her it would aid the long term goals of Ada, but in fact several vendors went ballistic, since they felt that GNAT threatened their markets. Note that not all vendors felt this way, but some big important ones did, enough to make a serious problem (I will not name names at this stage, it is water under the bridge after all!) The whole project hung in the balance, but squeaked through by taking two steps: 1) eliminating validation 2) adding some siderals to the contract that eliminated funding for several features, enough so that the result could be seen to be crippled (the list included fixed point and subunits, and some other stuff I have forgotten). So things forged ahead. The validation did not really matter, although it is ironic that when it came to awarding the contract for the academic compiler, the main reason that Mike Feldman's proposal for a GNAT based solution was turned down was the lack of validation! He had a letter of commitment from ACT which existed by that time, of the intent to validate, but was told that ACT was not a sufficiently credible company to ensure validation -- a bit ironic as ACT is still the only company to have achieved full 100% validations of the core and all annexes :-) (by the way Mike [Feldman] if you read this and want to correct or elaborate, feel free!) As for the siderals, we found a way around this. Both I and Ed Schonberg had sabbaticals due at NYU, and we took them during the project. Instead of rushing off to some far away land and thinking high academic thoughts, as is often done during sabbaticals, we stayed at NYU, and worked on the missing features. Since NYU, and not the DoD, was paying our salaries, no one could complain that DoD money was being used for prohibited features, and that is how GNAT came to be 100% complete, despite the insistence of other vendors in these siderals in the contract! The GNAT contract ended after four years (the total by the way was about $3 million during this period, a small fraction of the total money that the DoD had spent in direct and indirect subsidy of other Ada efforts previously). That's when ACT was formed. The cast of characters was pretty much unchanged from the NYU days, and in many respects the spirit of the project continued unchanged. The three changes were 1) The acquisition of serious paying customers, with SGI playing a crucial role in embracing GNAT and its open source basis early on. 2) A serious commitment to validation, which had been prohibited during the period of the NYU contract. 3) A considerable increase in the scale of the project, supported by these paying customers. At NYU, we had the equivalent of 6-8 full time people, and ACT and ACTE now have more than double this number. As a result, development has continued without any more expenditure of tax payers money, and a nice synergy has arisen between the paying customers, who get a supported commercial product that they can use in major projects, and the users of the public version, who provide a large testing community, and help smoke out problems and also to suggest improvements, many of which suggestions have been adopted in successive versions of GNAT. We have continued to maintain the practice started at NYU of building public binary versions. Although of course the sources are fully available, for many users it is important to have prebuilt binary versions, hopefully nicely packaged for easy installation. Building and preparing these public release versions is certainly not zero effort, but they have had a significant role in increasing the spread and use of Ada, a goal that ACT (and I personally) is (am) committed to pursuing. Robert Dewar -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar @ 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-09 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Tom Moran 1999-03-11 0:00 ` Arthur Evans Jr 2 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-09 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7c2c11$ila$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dewar@gnat.com wrote: > Incidentally a bit of history may provide useful > perspective here. I know that many readers are fully > So things forged ahead. The validation did not really > matter, although it is ironic that when it came to awarding > the contract for the academic compiler, the main reason > that Mike Feldman's proposal for a GNAT based solution was > turned down was the lack of validation! He had a letter of I'm glad you cleared that up. I had heard talk of that a few years back, but I had gathered the "acedemic compiler" contract was the contract that Gnat was developed under, not some separate contract that came along later, and that Mike had lost with a bid based on Ada-Ed. Boy was I confused! Out of curiosity, were there any other "bids" on the gnat contract, or was it just written with NYU in mind? T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-09 0:00 ` robert_dewar 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-09 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7c3dpp$f1g$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dennison@telepath.com wrote: > I'm glad you cleared that up. I had heard talk of that a > few years back, but I had gathered the "acedemic > compiler" contract was the contract that Gnat was > developed under, not some separate contract that came > along later, and that Mike had lost with a bid based on > Ada-Ed. Boy was I confused! The academic compiler contract was completely separate from GNAT except that one bid involved GNAT (from Mike), and indeed there was an expectation early on that Metroworks might bid based on GNAT, but Metroworks got cold feet over GPL issues [they did not want to open source their stuff] (as best I understand what happened). There were at least two other bids, and the contract (for a student compiler for the PC and for the Mac) went to Intermetrics/Aonix, and is the basis for the current Object Ada product on the PC. To give a bit more perspective, we were getting pretty loud signals that AJPO did not want to put any more government money into GNAT at that point (there appeared to be continuing concern with competition with other vendors). I even had a discussion with one high up official (who I will not name) in AJPO who got very worried that GNAT might be validated, and asked me how this could be prevented (!) > Out of curiosity, were there any other "bids" on the gnat > contract, or was it just written with NYU in mind? There were no other bids, and I think it may have been sole-sourced -- note that we were in a unique position since this was part of the gcc system, and NYU was the official maintainer of gcc. Indeed without this relationship the initial development of GNAT would have been much more difficult, perhaps impossible. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Tom Moran 1999-03-11 0:00 ` Arthur Evans Jr 2 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Tom Moran @ 1999-03-09 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) This history is very helpful. Thank you. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Tom Moran @ 1999-03-11 0:00 ` Arthur Evans Jr 1999-03-11 0:00 ` dennison 2 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: Arthur Evans Jr @ 1999-03-11 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7c2c11$ila$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dewar@gnat.com wrote: > Incidentally a bit of history may provide useful perspective here. I > know that many readers are fully familiar with this, but we always > have new readers who have discovered Ada more recently who don't > always know the history (and of course it is great to see new people > coming into the Ada fold). Thanks, Robert, for this important contribution. > I spread the gospel of the importance of a free software approach to > Ada 95 to Chris Anderson, and from my input, and from the input of > many others, it was Chris who was finally persuaded that this made > sense. [snip] > That's a rather *amazing* contract, and in retrospect, Chris was > surprised that she succeeded in getting it past the legal and > procurement scrutiny in the DoD. In fact I think it is a tremendous > achievment, and I am not sure anyone else other than Chris could have > managed it. The intended audience of Robert's note probably doesn't recognize Chris's name. She was Project Director of the DoD-funded project that upgraded the Ada-83 standard to Ada-95. All concerned with the project agreed that Chris's commitment to the project and deep understanding of DoD ways were essential to the success of what we did. The Ada community owes her an immense vote of thanks, and it's my pleasure to acknowledge her publicly here. Art Evans Arthur Evans Jr Ada Consulting Make the obvious change to my address to reply to me. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) 1999-03-11 0:00 ` Arthur Evans Jr @ 1999-03-11 0:00 ` dennison 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-11 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <ev_remove_this_ans-1103990847580001@192.168.1.254>, ev_remove_this_ans@evans.pgh.pa.us (Arthur Evans Jr) wrote: > The intended audience of Robert's note probably doesn't recognize > Chris's name. She was Project Director of the DoD-funded project that > upgraded the Ada-83 standard to Ada-95. All concerned with the project > agreed that Chris's commitment to the project and deep understanding of > DoD ways were essential to the success of what we did. The Ada > community owes her an immense vote of thanks, and it's my pleasure to > acknowledge her publicly here. I believe there's a picture of her and a little blurb about her in the "rogue's gallery" at adahome. T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-08 0:00 ` root 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar @ 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1 sibling, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-09 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36E43789.12AAED5C@chocolatesaltyballs.com>, root <white@chocolatesaltyballs.com> wrote: > The only way you could have done this was to have > exclusive copyright on the whole of GNAT. This IS an > insight for me, thank you, however you don't, so you > can't, so stop saying you could. (just thought! or gain > exclusive copyright via purchase of the copyright from > all the other parties of the GNAT version who's upgrade > is to be made proprietary ! I wonder if Microsoft are > about to make Linus and his mates an offer they can't > refuse?!? ) (by the way, please stick to usenet conventions and keep your lines under 80 characters, you are sending gigantic long lines which are a pain!) Could be done in theory, but in practice it would not work, either for Linux or for GNAT. Suppose someone did decide to buy the copyrights from NYU, ACT, and FSU (those are I think the only ones at the moment). Then they made a proprietary GNAT. Would that work well? I don't think so! Someone, maybe even the people at ACT :-) would just take the GPL'ed sources and continue to work with them. Yes, one might hypothesize that this new entity would do such a much better job of maintaining and developing GNAT that the proprietary version would prosper, but it seems unlikely to me, and even more unlikely in the case of Linux. In fact ACT would not be willing to assign the copyrights except using the FSF form of assignment. > >Suppose for example, you write some GPL'ed unit, you > >then assign the copyright in the normal manner to IBM. > >They then make a proprietary version, which they hold > >the copyright to, and refuse to license it, even to you. > >Sound unfair? > Definitively, which is a good reason to keep your > copyright and not sign it over to a commercial interest > like ACT for example. ACT can become IBM-ACT overnight if > the price is right. Yes, you've stated you're a private > company, so hostile takeover of ACT is improbably, but > who knows what the commercial future for an > Ada compiler vendor/support company is (Rosy I hope :). You missed an absolutely crucial point, which I think I made quite clearly. I was contrasting here the process of assigning your copyright to a commercial entity like IBM, to assigning it to a commercial entity like the FSF. What's the difference here? The difference is the form of the assignment. If you have not read the FSF assignment document, do so! You will find that it is cleverly crafted to exactly prevent the scenario I present above for IBM. So if you *do* assign your GPL copyright, and you do not want this to happen, then make sure you use the FSF assignment form. As I noted clearly in my original message ACT would only accept assignments under these conditions, and the whole point is that if software is assigned in this manner to ACT, then even if ACT does become ACT/IBM overnight (the Ada market presumably having improved considerably :-) then it would NOT be possible to "proprietarize" the assigned software. > No! I'm not confused. I'm just envisaging a situation > where some commercial interest abuses the GPL, who's > going to defend the GPL work? It would fall to the >FSF/Richard Stallman to pick the flag up. If I wrote some > work, placed it under the GPL and had it ripped by > Microsoft, the most I could do would be to report it to > FSF/Richard Stallman, the flag bearers of the licence, > and they'd definitely be interested because of > precedence precedent I assume you mean to say Certainly Richard might be willing to offer advice, but as I mentioned before he would not have legal standing in such a case. It is basically up to you to protect your own copyright. Note incidentally that recent court decisions have usefully clarified that copyright is not just of the literal expression of code, but also of its various levels of abstraction, so the copyright protection which underlies > Yes. I should have known better than to use the term > "copyleft" when talking re lawfully binding licence. I > was trying to rise above the strict interpretation of the > GPL, to highlight the intent. Well I am always amused by people proclaiming that they know the true intent of the GPL, and then complaining at us that we somehow are not following it, when in fact we work closely with Richard Stallman, and he knows exactly how we work, and *he* is perfectly comfortable that it is appropriate. We are indeed one of the few companies that is 100% committed to open source software for all our products, and that is considered part of the GNU project by Richard (and by us!) > I can't predict the future, no more than you, but I would > wager that the day GNAT has a single copyright source of > ACT, is the day everyone has to pay for a new version > (and not just the cost of making the CD). You can > disagree and almost certainly will, it's just my view and > that's my right. You of course have no basis whatsoever for this claim, but you are right, people are free to make any outrageous claim they like at any time! In fact we have found that following a fully open source policy has proven profitable and is widely accepted in the Ada community. It is one of the things that distinguishes GNAT from the competition, and it would not only be a violation of our stated policy, but would also be plain commercial foolishness to change it! > I shall watch the percentage of ACT copyright notices in > GNAT with interest. For GNAT proper, that is the compiler and the Ada 95 run-time library, you will not see much change. The percentage now is zero, and will remain zero. The place we use ACT copyrights is for completely new developments of new tools and new systems. Note that if we *wanted* to go the proprietary route, we perfectly well could with these new tools. For example, we could charge for the GNAT.xxx library hierarchy separately and make it proprietary. Or we could play the game Cygnus plays with win32, and release it under the GPL, so it could only be used in GPL'ed programs, and not in proprietary programs, and then have an expensive proprietary version. But in fact, all such tools under the ACT copyright have been issued in full open source format, using the GNAT modified GPL (a license incidentally that ACT pioneered to deal with making the runtime as usable as possible in as wide a variety of programs as possible). Why? Because that is the way we do business! Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-09 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dewar @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 1999-03-10 0:00 ` robert_dewar 0 siblings, 2 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) dewar@gnat.com wrote: > (by the way, please stick to usenet conventions and keep > your lines under 80 characters, you are sending gigantic > long lines which are a pain!) > I am using a feature in Netscape called "auto-wrap" ( thismodern tech. is great :) so I don't see the size of the line as its para from my view. But I have inserted hard returns as requested. > In > fact ACT would not be willing to assign the copyrights > except using the FSF form of assignment. > A "currently willing" caveat would fit well here as you're a company.Employees come and go, people sell shares and company policy changes according to market need. > Certainly Richard might be willing to offer advice, but as > I mentioned before he would not have legal standing in such > a case. It is basically up to you to protect your own > copyright. Note incidentally that recent court decisions > have usefully clarified that copyright is not just of the > literal expression of code, but also of its various levels > of abstraction, so the copyright protection which underlies So I stand in court, but I'd be funded by those with a concernfor open source and GPL. So who's REALLY bringing the case ? me or the open source community ? > > Yes. I should have known better than to use the term > > "copyleft" when talking re lawfully binding licence. I > > was trying to rise above the strict interpretation of the > > GPL, to highlight the intent. > > Well I am always amused by people proclaiming that they > know the true intent of the GPL, And your sheer arrogance visible in nearly every post amusesme. The true intent is stated the preamble in a manner the plain english society would be proud of. "The licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software--to make sure the software is free for all its users." The term "copyleft" was, I believe, intended to convey the intent of GPL detailed in plain english in the preamble. You don't need briefings from corporate lawyers to understand the intent ( even if the remaining "copyright" rights escaped you :) Thats the crux of these posts and discussion of the nature of the commercial and public versions of GPL GNAT and the fact that you seek to prevent the copy and redistribution of a GPL version called 3.11b2, stating first that its not based on 3.11p then that they are both GPL but not the same, then that they atleast differ in version header and then that they only differ in version headers. If you want to concentrate/distract on my lack of knowledge of the finer points of the GPL, fine. After many posts I've got from you, by any means, a statement that 3.11b2 is 3.11p. > and then complaining at > us that we somehow are not following it, Not complaining, just seeking clarification regards the differencesin "commercial" and "public" versions of GNAT, and resolving how you get to the position of saying a GPL work is not for redistribution because its commercial. > when in fact we > work closely with Richard Stallman, and he knows exactly > how we work, and *he* is perfectly comfortable that it is > appropriate. Funny. I contacted GNU.org via email sometime ago and they toldme that while ACT were perfectly entitled to require you to part with a "support" fee for a copy of their "commercial" version it was not in the spirit of the GPL and anyone who obtained a copy was still free to redistribute it. For the price of a CD for example. > We are indeed one of the few companies that > is 100% committed to open source software for all our > products, and that is considered part of the GNU project > by Richard (and by us!) Again funny, when I stated that you were one of the few commericalmaintainers of GPL source, you told me I didn't know what was going on. > > I can't predict the future, no more than you, but I would > > wager that the day GNAT has a single copyright source of > > ACT, is the day everyone has to pay for a new version > > (and not just the cost of making the CD). You can > > disagree and almost certainly will, it's just my view and > > that's my right. > > You of course have no basis whatsoever for this claim, but > you are right, people are free to make any outrageous claim > they like at any time! Well, depends what gets your goat as to what you find outrageous.The basis I have for this claim are GPL versions I cannot see without paying a fee well above redistribution costs. Calling a GPL work "commerical", restricting its redistribution and asking everyone to believe on trust ( however well place) that theres no functional difference between this and the "public" version is something I find outrageous. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-10 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1 sibling, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: Chris Morgan @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) SpamSpamSpam <spam@spam.com> writes: > I am using a feature in Netscape called "auto-wrap" ( thismodern tech. is > great :) so I don't see the size of the line > as its para from my view. But I have inserted hard returns > as requested. Not all newsreaders (even modern ones) auto-wrap intelligently on word boundaries, so thismodern tech. is not great, it's best with some cooperation from the users. > A "currently willing" caveat would fit well here as you're a > company.Employees come and go, people sell shares and company policy > changes according to market need. I think you'll find ACT is unusually focussed and the employees are unlikely to allow it to be assimilated. [SNIP] > > Well I am always amused by people proclaiming that they > > know the true intent of the GPL, > > And your sheer arrogance visible in nearly every post amusesme. The true > intent is stated the preamble in a manner the plain > english society would be proud of. > > "The licenses for most software are designed to take away your > freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General > Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share > and change free software--to make sure the software is free for > all its users." I think arguing by reference to the preamble or the GNU manifesto is tempting but doomed to failure. RMS had very lofty goals when he wrote them, but he was already old and wise enough to pay enough attention to the details (i.e. the detailed statements of the GPL) to make a workable pragmatic system of licensing and distribution. We have had other posters complaining about perceived mismatches between the manifesto and the license, but really they carry no weight, the GPL is all we really have to go on (unless you have some software which is licensed by "please abide by the manifesto"). > > The term "copyleft" was, I believe, intended to convey the intent > of GPL detailed in plain english in the preamble. You don't > need briefings from corporate lawyers to understand the intent ( > even if the remaining "copyright" rights escaped you :) The intent is one thing, but the actual position is controlled by the GPL. > > Thats the crux of these posts and discussion of the nature of the > commercial and public versions of GPL GNAT and the fact that > you seek to prevent the copy and redistribution of a GPL version > called 3.11b2, stating first that its not based on 3.11p then that > they are both GPL but not the same, then that they atleast differ > in version header and then that they only differ in version headers. > If you want to concentrate/distract on my lack of knowledge of > the finer points of the GPL, fine. After many posts I've got > from you, by any means, a statement that 3.11b2 is 3.11p. The public version is never the same as the latest commercial version. If you have a support contract you can get newer versions of GNAT including special experimental fixes and so on immediately after they arrive in the source tree - possibly way too soon. By the time the unsupported users such as myself get a new version of GNAT, it is already an old version for the supported users as each time it bit someone ACT fixed it under paid contract until it stabilised nicely and looked like something even the great unwashed (again, i.e. me) could use productively. That lag is approved by the FSF. Maybe not applauded whole-heartedly by people like egcs and the Linux kernel team, but not a violation. > > > and then complaining at > > us that we somehow are not following it, > > Not complaining, just seeking clarification regards the differencesin > "commercial" and "public" versions of GNAT, and resolving > how you get to the position of saying a GPL work is not for > redistribution because its commercial. i.e. because its usable with commercial full-time support only The other way of phrasing it is "because it's not tested, not proven, not stable, just not ready". > > > when in fact we > > work closely with Richard Stallman, and he knows exactly > > how we work, and *he* is perfectly comfortable that it is > > appropriate. > > Funny. I contacted GNU.org via email sometime ago and they toldme that > while ACT were perfectly entitled to require you > to part with a "support" fee for a copy of their "commercial" version > it was not in the spirit of the GPL and anyone who obtained a copy > was still free to redistribute it. For the price of a CD for > example. This is true. Many moons ago I was a supported user and received a wavefront compiler. Someone else was interested in it and we discussed the matter by email. I concluded I had the right to give it to him, but that I wouldn't at that time - there is the responsibility to the community to be balanced with the rights of one user. Since wavefronts are (I think) just automatic output of ACT's quality control system (proof that it builds essentially) they don't seem very valuable compared to the risk of them getting out onto the Internet and causing a huge flurry of pointless emails and newsgroup postings. When a release is frozen but not available because it's brethren on other platforms (e.g. WinNT) are still having problems, e.g. install wizards, it would be tempting for me to ask for a new version from someone who was supported. In fact I bet a few of these releases have been passed around, but it seems the recipients have had the sense to keep quiet about it. In my case I haven't got to the bleeding edge of GNAT tools where I _needed_ the newest one for a long long time (3-4 years). [SNIP] > > > I can't predict the future, no more than you, but I would > > > wager that the day GNAT has a single copyright source of > > > ACT, is the day everyone has to pay for a new version > > > (and not just the cost of making the CD). You can > > > disagree and almost certainly will, it's just my view and > > > that's my right. > > > > You of course have no basis whatsoever for this claim, but > > you are right, people are free to make any outrageous claim > > they like at any time! > > Well, depends what gets your goat as to what you find outrageous.The basis > I have for this claim are GPL versions I cannot see without > paying a fee well above redistribution costs. Calling a GPL work > "commerical", restricting its redistribution and asking everyone to believe > on > trust ( however well place) that theres no functional difference between > this and the "public" version is something I find outrageous. Well, many of the supported users post here from time to time, and from my experience the situation is _precisely_ as Prof. Dewar says. The commercially supported people generally work from the latest commercial version. The only difference between these and the public versions is that if a commercial one breaks they will fix it for you. Think of them as release candidates and think of the commercial users as late beta testers (wavefront users are alpha/beta testers). Several release candidates can occur within one broad release (3.11b2 implies versioning within 3.11). When a release candidate works on all platforms, it's good enough to be made public. They swap in a different version number, build the compiler from scratch and make the release. Thus technically speaking it's not the same build as any of the commercial versions (sum gnatmake is different) but from the users point of view it's every bit as good as the release candidate that shares the same source profile. In case you're wondering what the point of this explanation is, I should add that when I was a supported user, the Ada user group in our company suggested it would be prudent to simply stick to the public releases on the grounds that we wanted the most stable versions. Prof. Dewar thinks that attitude is taking things too far, but it certainly didn't seem to us that the commercial releases contained any goodies that we should grab asap. It was all about defence in depth - use the public one, if that breaks get the latest commercial release and see if ACT have solved the problem, if not ask them to fix it and get a wavefront with the fix. Once the fix is firmly in place move back to the most stable version available containing the fix (I'm talking about production compilers here). Naturally I always had the very latest version I could lay my hands on in my own area, and now I'm unsupported I do miss the ability to go and get the commercial releases, but I know that they are not the unqualified advantage you seem to think. Cheers, Chris -- Chris Morgan <mihalis at ix.netcom.com http://mihalis.net "We're going to start selling Linux to single-party users very soon. Q: It's going to be on the menu? A: Yes. You'll go to Dell, pull down "operating system," and click "Linux." - Michael Dell ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <876789s6or.fsf@mihalis.ix.netcom.com>, Chris Morgan <mihalis@ix.netcom.com> wrote: > In case you're wondering what the point of this > explanation is, I should add that when I was a supported > user, the Ada user group in our > company suggested it would be prudent to simply stick to > the public releases on the grounds that we wanted the > most stable versions. Just to clarify things here. The most recent commercial release is almost always the same source base as the public release. For example, the current commercial release is 3.11b2, which is the commercial release to which 3.11p corresponds. Generally we expect our customers to be using 3.11b2, since this is the latest stable commercial release. We advise them to use 3.11b2 rather than 3.11p for several reasons: 1. THe 3.11b2 comes from us. When you get 3.11p from some public site, you really don't know what you are getting, and neither do we, we obviously can't guarantee what is out there is the same as what we put out. It probably is but we have no control and no assurance of this. 2. The commercial version is the one which we support and for which we provide a guarantee. For example we will provide formal Y2K certification for 3.11b2, but we never make any such guarantees for the public system. Now of course a number of our customers are using later versions. We don't make these automatically available (Chris in fact did NOT always have his hands on the latest version!) We only make them available if in the judgment of both ACT and the customer, it makes sense to move to what we call a "wavefront version", identified by a w in the version number, as in 3.12w, to fix a specific problem. Where possible, both ACT and most customers prefer to work around problems than to get new compiler versions, but the development of GNAT is very rapid, and already the 3.12w wavefront contains not only a large number of fixes, but also some very important new functionality, developed for, and in some cases funded by, customers, and of course these customers get access to this wavefront version to test out these new capabilities (an example is the -gnatR feature that I highlighted the other day). The features file for 3.12w already contains about 130 lines listing some 40-50 new features and fixes. We are working towards getting this new level of the technology releasable as fast as possible. First we will make a 3.12a release for our customers, and then if there are no glitches, make a corresponding 3.12p. if there are minor glitches, we will fix them first. Note that although some customers move to wavefronts rapidly, many have a (very reasonable) policy of only looking at official releases, so when we announce 3.12a, we get a lot of people looking at it in a short time. If we do find glitches we will make a 3.12a1, 3.12a2 etc and iterate (that's why we arrived at 3.11b2) before we make the public release. Finally I note that Chris refers to EGCS and Linux. IN fact the development situation for these projects is much the same as in the GNAT case, with regard to major developments. Cygnus is doing major work on gcc on its internal tree. You won't know the details unless you are a Cygnus customer under an appropriate non-disclosure agreement. They will synchronize these changes with EGCS at an appropriate point. Similarly within redhat and the other Linux companies all sorts of major internal development is taking place that has not seen the light of day yet. What is missing in the GNAT case is more active playing and contributing with/to the public versions. Note that Marcus Kuhn and his band of Linux enthusiasts are trying to do something about this, and we are working with them to figure out how to make this work smoothly. We are also working out how to integrate GNAT into the EGCS release, and perhaps this will also encourage that kind of activity. I don't mean to say there is NO useful work going on, not at all, Jerry's announcement this morning for example is a great case of important volunteer contributions, and there are many others. Everyone is in favor of seeing a more vital activity there! Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: Chris Morgan @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) dewar@gnat.com writes: > Now of course a number of our customers are using later > versions. We don't make these automatically available > (Chris in fact did NOT always have his hands on the latest > version!) We only make them available if in the judgment > of both ACT and the customer, it makes sense to move to > what we call a "wavefront version", identified by a w in > the version number, as in 3.12w, to fix a specific problem. True. I did get a wavefront once or twice though and used it myself for quite a while before the next numbered version. I also had a lot of paperwork to do before changing which compiler the average developer was supposed to do which was good discipline but tedious. > Finally I note that Chris refers to EGCS and Linux. IN fact > the development situation for these projects is much the > same as in the GNAT case, with regard to major > developments. > > Cygnus is doing major work on gcc on its internal tree. > You won't know the details unless you are a Cygnus customer > under an appropriate non-disclosure agreement. They will > synchronize these changes with EGCS at an appropriate > point. Similarly within redhat and the other Linux > companies all sorts of major internal development is > taking place that has not seen the light of day yet. I'm not familiar with the precise details, but at least some of the open source projects have open cvs trees (typically read-only to non-members). In particular though egcs/=cygnus[1] and Linux kernel/=RedHat and although you are right generally I think the projects I mentioned are a little bit more open than ACT. I don't mean this in the negative sense at all and I don't want to get into the "Cathedral/Bazaar" argument (except to say I'm not fond of the FSF bashing that has gone on and not at all convinced that ESR is obviously a better advocate of free/open source than RMS). [1]Prof. Dewar was insistent that this is true and often not recognized publically. I guess it's the "major developments" bit that is key here - perhaps the open informal teams are getting left behind by heretofore private work I don't know about, it's entirely possible. Chris -- Chris Morgan <mihalis at ix.netcom.com http://mihalis.net "We're going to start selling Linux to single-party users very soon. Q: It's going to be on the menu? A: Yes. You'll go to Dell, pull down "operating system," and click "Linux." - Michael Dell ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <87lnh52i3d.fsf@mihalis.ix.netcom.com>, Chris Morgan <mihalis@ix.netcom.com> wrote: > [1]Prof. Dewar was insistent that this is true and often > not recognized publically. I guess it's the "major > developments" bit that is key here - perhaps the open > informal teams are getting left behind by heretofore > private work I don't know about, it's entirely possible. Well you certainly can't know about the internal Cygnus work if you have not signed a non-disclosure, and even then they often hold their road maps quite closely even with respect to their major customers. The important thing to realize is that EGCS is NOT a Cygnus project. It is independent at this stage. Yes, Cygnus has a lot of influence, and several people on the EGCS board are from Cygnus, and Cygnus also invests substantial resources in keeping EGCS synchronized to some extent with their internal tree. But major development work that goes on in the internal tree is not reflected day to day in the EGCS tree, and indeed you would not want it to be in my opinion, and the Cygnus operating procedure seems quite reasonable. Same thing with GDB, the GDB 5.0 tree that is internal to Cygnus is most certainly not externally visible, and details of this tree are released only to their closest large customers. Again, this seems entirely reasonable to me! As for Redhat and Linux, the same kind of relationship exists between the internal Redhat development and the externally visible version of Linux. In that case we know a little more about what is going on inside, from news stories, for example, the development of the new journaling file system which is reportedly going on. The fact of the matter is that major developments require a lot of synchronized design and planning, and are just not susceptible to the approach of having lots of people contributing independently. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-10 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan @ 1999-03-10 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1 sibling, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-10 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36E6361A.D651CAD7@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > Funny. I contacted GNU.org via email sometime ago and > they toldme that while ACT were perfectly entitled to > require you to part with a "support" fee for a copy of > their "commercial" version it was not in the spirit of > the GPL and anyone who obtained a copy was still free to > redistribute it. For the price of a CD for example. Well who knows how you described the situation. The fact is that Richard Stallman, with whom I talk frequently, knows exactly what we do and is perfectly comfortable with our way of doing business. Probably what caused the confusion when you sent mesages to gnu.org (note you did not quote your message that you sent them), was that you implied that the commercial version was significantly different from the public version, which it is not (the significantly here covers just two things: 1) the version number 2) the fact that the public version has no warranty, whereas the commercial version is warranteed. Note also that of course once the public version is out, we have no control over what happens to it then, and you can't be sure that what you have is exactly what we distributed (it might have bug fixes and be better, and then again, the fixes might be incorrect, since for one thing the regression tests that we use are not available publicly -- they cannot be because they are primarily proprietary customer code). > Well, depends what gets your goat as to what you find > outrageous.The basis I have for this claim are GPL > versions I cannot see without paying a fee well above > redistribution costs. Once again, there is absolutely NOTHING in the GPL that suggests that GPL software must be made available for the distribution costs. The fact that ACT does in fact make our software available, without even charging the distribution costs (which we assume), is nothing to do with the GPL. > Calling a GPL work "commerical" The idea that GPL'ed software is somehow inherently non-commercial is actually fundamentally at odds with the intention of the GNU project, which is very definitely intended to provide the possibility of viable commercial alternatives to proprietary software. Remember that commercial does not mean proprietary! > restricting its redistribution We do not restrict redistribution in any way. As you frequently point out, anyone who has the commercial version is free to distribute it. They do not do so probably because 1) Companies like Boeing (the license holder) are not in the business of redistributing licensed softare to others. 2) They understand that such distribution would not be particularly helpful to the Ada community. In particular, it is useful for people to understand But at no point do we in ANY WAY restrict redistribution. This is a claim your are making without substance. > and asking everyone to believe on trust ( however well > place) that theres no functional difference between > this and the "public" version is something I find > outrageous. I see no basis for this outrage. We freely choose to distribute the products of our labor under the GPL (that's our choice for much of the system that we have created at ACT, no one forces us to do that), and we fully adhere to requirements of the GPL (though actually no one forces us to do that either, for example if we did not distribute the sources of ACT copyrighted stuff, the GPL has nothing to say about it, ACT owns that software. The important thing to realize is that GPL is not some kind of guarantee that an author will always do the things you want them to do. No one can force the creator of copyrighted software to behave in a particular manner. You are quite right, ACT has a stated policy, which it has unwaveringly followed, to be fully committed to open source software. Unlike some other open source software companies, we have not waffled around on this issue, and trie to proprietarize some components of what we do. But that does not mean that ACT might not change its mind in the future. I am sure that what would happen if ACT did change its mind would be that some other organization would pick up where ACT left off. Maintaining and developing an Ada tool chain is not an inexpensive project, ACT invests of the order of millions of dollars a year in this task, but so far the open source model has worked well to support this activity, so it is hard to see why, from a purely commercial point of view, ACT would change its business practices since they are working well. Indeed, in this age where commercialization of open source software is becoming more and more accepted and known, we find that our business model is regarded as less and less peculiar! Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` David Botton 1999-03-07 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1 sibling, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: David Botton @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) root wrote: > Note the use of the "if" at the start. Are you claiming literal > ownership of GNAT? I think Robert Dewar was referring to those parts of GNAT which were written by ACT. There is no reason why he could not withhold further development of these portions or re-release those portions as separate packages not under the GPL. > ALL versions of GNAT are GPL and they always will be, > You can no more take GNAT back, that Larry Walls, Linus Torvalds and > Richard Stallman could take back perl, linux, or emacs. That may be true, but the GPL does not say that the software must be released to the public. There are many drivers for linux and other patches to the kernel that are not GPL and have all the same restrictions as more "traditional" non-GPL software. As an illustration, the program PINE branched about a year ago in to a GPL version and a non-GPL version. GNAT as it is today can not be taken away, but that doesn't mean that future work has to be made public or under the GPL. > > > When you get a licensed product from Microsoft, you know > > perfectly well that they still own the program and can do > > anything they like with it. > > So you have to use Microsoft as an example to make yourself look good in > the GPL world ? No, Robert Dewar was making it clear the the Microsoft EULA and the Free Software Foundation GPL are the same category of document, a license agreement. > The terms copyleft, and its simply a licence as a Rolls Royce and a Lada > are cars. Is copyleft a legal term? I thought it was slang for the copyrighted software that used copyright law to keep information public instead of private. I'll look it up. David Botton ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-07 0:00 ` David Botton @ 1999-03-07 0:00 ` robert_dewar 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-07 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36E294AB.86AFBA58@Botton.com>, David Botton <David@Botton.com> wrote: > I think Robert Dewar was referring to those parts of GNAT > which were written by ACT. There is no reason why he > could not withhold further development of these portions > or re-release those portions as separate packages not > under the GPL. Well not "he" (I don't hold the copyrights) but rather ACT. Of course as I have emphasized, ACT is a 100% open source committed company, and we fully intend to make all our current and future technology available under the GPL in open source form. Part of the reason I emphasize the legal situation here is that the open software community needs to understand that this kind of proprietarization is possible, and to keep a close watch on it, and yell loudly where appropriate! > As an illustration, the program PINE branched about a > year ago in to a GPL version and a non-GPL version. GNAT > as it is today can not be taken away, but that doesn't > mean that future work has to be made public or under the > GPL. This is precisely the sort of thing I am concerned about. Open source software at many companies is constantly under pressure from a more conventional (e.g. venture capital) point of view that the way to make money on free software is to make it proprietary. At ACT, we have no investors to keep happy. The only investment in ACT were from its participants (officers working for free for a while, some small loans from officers, and a few deferred paychecks early on, other than that we ran from revenue). At this stage, ACT has been on a firm financial footing for quite a while, with all its bills paid, the payroll met on time, and money in the bank. We are not getting Bill-Gates style rich, or even typical-broker-on-wall-street rich, but we are doing fine, and most importantly we are not beholden to investors with more interest in money than in Ada. We plan incidentally to release a financial report at the end of the calendar year. We don't have to do this, since we are a private company, but we think the Ada community will be pleased to know that a company with 100% Ada orientation can be financially viable. > Is copyleft a legal term? no, defintely not! > I thought it was slang for the copyrighted software that > used copyright law to keep information public instead of > private. I'll look it up. yes! that's right, and in my experience the term has caused quite a bit of confusion, so we never use it. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` bourguet 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 3 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: bourguet @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <36DFA6FB.D3A2AD84@spam.com>, spamwithchipsplease@spam.com wrote: > dewar@gnat.com wrote: > > > a) We don't want versions to be distributed publicly till > > they are in good shape and installation glitch free, > > Strange that you inflict your "Beta" versions exclusively on your paying > customers. Have you already supported Beta version? From a developper point of view, I understand very well the interest of limited circulation of beta version. It is usually the way other free sofware developement works... The restriction may be other than beeing a customer of a compagny, but there is often a restriction or at least a strong incitation of not using the latest unstable version or the snapshot if don't want to help coding. Having numerous reports of bugs already fixed is not something helpfull. And published versions tend to stick on a long time. > I think the success of open source has been based on public > releases feeding back to the developers bug reports. I think the interest of a more open development is in the number of persons ready to help in other ways than just bug reports and testing. ACT may be perhaps underestimating this help, but I've no way to tell. And I know that I'd be of no value for this. > Having run a > GNU/linux system for 3 years, I like many others are use to "feature-rich" > pre-releases. That's your choice, not mine (I'm also using Linux but I tend to stick to a release until there is something new I've a use for). And it is a different problem than was is best for the development of the program. -- Jean-Marc -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` bourguet @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bomut$jst$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, bourguet@my-dejanews.com wrote: > > I think the success of open source has been based on public > > releases feeding back to the developers bug reports. > > I think the interest of a more open development is in the number of persons > ready to help in other ways than just bug reports and testing. ACT may be > perhaps underestimating this help, but I've no way to tell. And I know that > I'd be of no value for this. Good point. There's probably no way to guage it at all at this point, short of actually going that way. T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 0 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dewar @ 1999-03-05 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bp1m1$tt0$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, dennison@telepath.com wrote: > Good point. There's probably no way to guage it at all at > this point, short of actually going that way. Well for several years, we issued new releases VERY frequently, and also provided free support for all GNAT users, so indeed we have tried this. What we found was the situation is much as it is now. People can and do contribute by providing new packages, bindings, etc, but we do not see (and did not see) much in the way of contributions to the core technology. That's not surprising at all, the compiler itself is a complex piece of software, and just getting fully on top of understanding it, let alone getting to the point of making structural changes or even fixing simple bugs, is not a casual part time occupation (remember that ACT has the equivalent of about 16 full time people working on the core technology). Of course there are exceptions, and we appreciate these exceptions. In several cases, people who have made these kind of volunteer contributions are now working full time for ACT or ACT/Europe :-) Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-02 0:00 SGI GNAT Question? (Long) Paul Colvert 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Gautier 1999-03-02 0:00 ` David C. Hoos, Sr. 2 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Gautier @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) To: colvert Maybe I miss something, but normally once you add the correct directories in ADA_INCLUDE_PATH and ADA_OBJECTS_PATH, the commands: gnatmake main_program_1 gnatmake main_program_2 - with the additional -n32 or other options - should do the job without manually calling gcc, gnatlink, gnatbind,... -- Gautier ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long) 1999-03-02 0:00 SGI GNAT Question? (Long) Paul Colvert 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Gautier @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` David C. Hoos, Sr. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko 2 siblings, 1 reply; 46+ messages in thread From: David C. Hoos, Sr. @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In your lengthy message (which might have better been submitted to chat@gnat.com), you didn't specify in which directory you were when you issued the various commands. However, I'll tell you how I build programs on SGI platforms of a similar kind, and with similar library structures. Some details of my work differ, so I'm only 99.9 % sure about the -n32 details. We must use -o32 because we depend on some third-party libraries with o32 objects, and we deal with that by editing the specs file which can be located using the gcc -v command. Also, since I edit and do test compiles from within Emacs, I use Emacs Ada-mode project files as described in the Gnat User's Guide. I also use a Makefile to "remember" the various options and commands, but I'll show how I would do it manually. When I want to build an executable (using your directory names) I cd to the linklib directory, and issue: gnatmake -i -m \ -I/src/common \ -I/src/models/model_1 \ -I/src/models/model_2 \ -I/src/models/model_3 \ -o <main-unit-name> \ <main-unit-name> \ -cargs -g -O0 -n32 \ -largs -n32 This compiles any out-of-date objects _in the directory in which the source code resides_, then binds and links. The switches which you didn't mention, and their purposes are: -i Excerpting from the Gnat User's Guide here -- In normal mode, gnatmake compiles all object files and ALI files into the current directory. If the -i switch is used, then instead object files and ALI files that already exist are overwritten in place. This means that once a large project is organized into separate directories in the desired manner, then gnatmake will automatically maintain and update this organization. If no ALI files are found on the Ada object path (section Search Paths and the Run-Time Library (RTL)), the new object and ALI files are created in the directory containing the source being compiled. If another organization is desired, where objects and sources are kept in different directories, a useful technique is to create dummy ALI files in the desired directories. When detecting such a dummy file, gnatmake will be forced to recompile the corresponding source file, and it will be put the resulting object and ALI files in the directory where it found the dummy file. My make file does a "touch <file-name>.ali" in the appropriate directory for all compilation units (i.e. for each body file thet is not a separate, and for each spec file which has no body), to create the "dummy" files to which the Gnat User's Guide refers. -m Again, excerpting from the Gnat User's Guide -- Specifies that the minimum necessary amount of recompilation be performed. In this mode (gnatmake) ignores time stamp differences when the only modifications to a source file consist in adding/removing comments, empty lines, spaces or tabs. This means that if you have changed the comments in a source file or have simply reformatted it, using this switch will tell gnatmake not to recompile files that depend on it (provided other sources on which these files depend have undergone no semantic modifications). We use this because some of our source files are created at build time by gnatchop followed by gnatprep. We have multiple platforms for which we compile with platform-dependent code conditionally compiled with the aid of gnatprep, and we still must use VADS, as well, so our source code repository files are all .a files. This means that source files are always generated anew by passing through gnatchop (where we cannot a-priori determine the filenames of gnat chop's output), then through gnatprep for the conditional compilation. The upshot is that all source files then have newer timestamps than the corresponding .o and .ali files, but the -m switch never fails to do the right thing in terms of only compiling files which have changed semantically. I generally only explicitly compile with gcc when I have edited a file with Emacs, preferring to let gnatmake and my Makefile figure out the minimum compilation required. By using the project files to specify the dependencies and compile switches, etc., for each directory, I insure that all files compiled from within Emacs will have been compiled with the same options which I specify in the Makefile. I know this has been long, but I hope it's helpful. It's been about three months since I did SGI work with GNAT, but we were using gnat-3.11b, and I've moved on to a new company, so I have noting but my memory to go on. Except for the -n32, however, This is typical of the way I do things on all platforms using gnat. I've used this technique on SGI, Alpha, Solaris Linux, Win32, and DOS. David C. Hoos, Sr. ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` David C. Hoos, Sr. @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` kvisko 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dennison ` (4 more replies) 0 siblings, 5 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: kvisko @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <MJ3xAGKZ#GA.252@pet.hiwaay.net>, "David says... > >In your lengthy message (which might have better been submitted to >chat@gnat.com), Why? In Other language newsgroups, such as C/C++/Java, people all the time ask questions in reference to using specific compilers such as VC++, Borland , gcc, etc.. No one thinks of saying that each compiler users should have a separate mailing list. If so, then those news groups will be almost empty. I think with Ada, with hardly any interest in it from the general public, to have separate mailing lists for separate compilers is silly and counter productive. It is not like this news group is so busy. Even if it were, then this will be a good thing, not a bad thing. We should have all Ada discussions here, GNAT or none GNAT. Having separate mailing lists for Ada related stuff don't make sense to me given the small Ada community size. All public Ada discussions should be done here, on any topic, any one can simply ignore threads they are not interested in. Why are the Ada people so up-tight about these things? While on other newsgroups no one makes any point about these things? May be have some convention of subject, where if the question is on GNAT, it will say "GNAT: etc..", this way, people can easily not read it if they do not want to. kvisko ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Mike Silva ` (3 subsequent siblings) 4 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: dennison @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bgmqm$82v@drn.newsguy.com>, kvisko@ wrote: > In article <MJ3xAGKZ#GA.252@pet.hiwaay.net>, "David says... > > > >In your lengthy message (which might have better been submitted to > >chat@gnat.com), > > Why? > > In Other language newsgroups, such as C/C++/Java, people all the time > ask questions in reference to using specific compilers such as > VC++, Borland , gcc, etc.. I think (I hope) what David was getting at was that the gnat mailing list has a different audience than c.l.a., which is better equipped to answer gnat-specific questions. Such posts are *not* off topic on c.l.a. Its just that there are a lot of gnat users subscribed to gnat-chat that couldn't give a rodent's posterior about other compilers, software engineering flamewars, and language arcania that is the normal fare here. T.E.D. -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dennison @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Mike Silva 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen ` (2 subsequent siblings) 4 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Mike Silva @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) kvisko@ wrote in message <7bgmqm$82v@drn.newsguy.com>... <...> >In Other language newsgroups, such as C/C++/Java, people all the time >ask questions in reference to using specific compilers such as >VC++, Borland , gcc, etc.. <...> >All public Ada discussions should be done here, on any topic, any one can >simply ignore threads they are not interested in. Why are the Ada people >so up-tight about these things? While on other newsgroups no one makes >any point about these things? Have you looked at comp.lang.c? I think 80% of the messages there must boil down to "It's not ANSI C, ask your question elsewhere". That applies to questions about compilers, libraries, you name it. I think 50% of the messages deal with the dreaded void main( void ) or // comments alone. I find c.l.a. has much more tolerance regarding the range of questions asked (and I agree with your first sentence above). BTW, I'm not bashing C (my primary language), just commenting on what I see in c.l.c. vs. c.l.a. Gee, I don't think I've ever seen anybody here say "It's not ANSI Ada" :) Mike ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Mike Silva @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Samuel Mize 1999-03-02 0:00 ` robert_dewar 4 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Larry Kilgallen @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bgmqm$82v@drn.newsguy.com>, kvisko@ writes: > In article <MJ3xAGKZ#GA.252@pet.hiwaay.net>, "David says... >> >>In your lengthy message (which might have better been submitted to >>chat@gnat.com), > > Why? I do not recall your original post, so I cannot comment on whether _it_ is more appropriate in a compiler-specific venue. Many are, however. > In Other language newsgroups, such as C/C++/Java, people all the time > ask questions in reference to using specific compilers such as > VC++, Borland , gcc, etc.. And in other languages one gets equivalence between integers and pointers without asking for it :-). Throughout the internet newsgroups, however, there are various styles of operation. > No one thinks of saying that each compiler users should have a separate mailing > list. If so, then those news groups will be almost empty. >> It is not like this news group is so busy. Even if it were, then this will > be a good thing, not a bad thing. > > We should have all Ada discussions here, GNAT or none GNAT. Having separate > mailing lists for Ada related stuff don't make sense to me given the small > Ada community size. The level of activity on comp.lang.ada is about right by my standards. Padding it with information of marginal interest to some readers does a disservice to those who have other things to do in their life. > All public Ada discussions should be done here, on any topic, any one can > simply ignore threads they are not interested in. Why are the Ada people > so up-tight about these things? While on other newsgroups no one makes > any point about these things? Many other newsgroups have their own ways of conducting business, but they may not be ones with which you are familiar. > May be have some convention of subject, where if the question is on GNAT, > it will say "GNAT: etc..", this way, people can easily not read it if they > do not want to. No, I want to know things about GNAT that are of general interest, but not the details of bug discussions, etc. Larry Kilgallen ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko ` (2 preceding siblings ...) 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Samuel Mize 1999-03-02 0:00 ` robert_dewar 4 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: Samuel Mize @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) kvisko@ wrote: > In article <MJ3xAGKZ#GA.252@pet.hiwaay.net>, "David says... >> >>In your lengthy message (which might have better been submitted to >>chat@gnat.com), > > Why? Simply because a lot of GNAT users pay attention to that mailing list, but don't read comp.lang.ada. He wasn't saying "you bad boy," he was just pointing you at a resource where you were more likely to get help. > All public Ada discussions should be done here, on any topic, any one can > simply ignore threads they are not interested in. Why are the Ada people > so up-tight about these things? Why are you characterizing someone as "up-tight about these things" on the basis of two words in a post that was trying to help you, and continuing the discussion you started, right here in this forum? Best, Sam Mize -- Samuel Mize -- smize@imagin.net (home email) -- Team Ada Fight Spam: see http://www.cauce.org/ \\\ Smert Spamonam ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
* Re: GNAT discussions should be here as well. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko ` (3 preceding siblings ...) 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Samuel Mize @ 1999-03-02 0:00 ` robert_dewar 4 siblings, 0 replies; 46+ messages in thread From: robert_dewar @ 1999-03-02 0:00 UTC (permalink / raw) In article <7bgmqm$82v@drn.newsguy.com>, kvisko@ wrote: > All public Ada discussions should be done here, on any > topic, any one can simply ignore threads they are not > interested in. Why are the Ada people so up-tight about > these things? While on other newsgroups no one makes > any point about these things? I think the answer to that is quite easy, on other newsgroups, most serious users of the language have departed, and the newsgroups are of even less use to serious users of the language than comp.lang.ada is. CLA still has a large number of very knowledgable Ada folks, including the original designers, who closely follow the group. Nevertheless, it is our experience that many serious users of GNAT (including by the way most of the people at ACT itself) do not find it worth while to take the time to read CLA. There is still a lot of noise (off topic stuff, advocacy on C vs Ada, various gripes etc) which serious Ada users find unhelpful. The chat@gnat.com list has been far more focussed, and has an absolute minimum of off-topic noise (basically we don't permit it there at all), and you will find many experienced GNAT users who will be able to help with GNAT problems there who do not read CLA. Obviously there are exceptions, for example, David Hoos' detailed post on how to use GNAT on the SGI. But note that if the original question had been sent to chat@gnat.com, there are many *current* users of both n32 and o32 GNAT who could have also provided assistance. No one is preventing anyone from posting GNAT questions or questions on other specific compilers to CLA, but generally you will speak to a larger and more knowledgable audience if you use the chat@gnat.com list. Robert Dewar Ada Core Technologies -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==---------- http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own ^ permalink raw reply [flat|nested] 46+ messages in thread
end of thread, other threads:[~1999-03-11 0:00 UTC | newest] Thread overview: 46+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed) -- links below jump to the message on this page -- 1999-03-02 0:00 SGI GNAT Question? (Long) Paul Colvert 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-03 0:00 ` Paul Colvert 1999-03-03 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-04 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-04 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-05 0:00 ` GNAT Field Test scope (was SGI GNAT Question) Larry Kilgallen 1999-03-05 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-08 0:00 ` Marin David Condic 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` root 1999-03-07 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-08 0:00 ` root 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Some GNAT history (was Re: SGI GNAT Question? (Long)) dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-09 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-09 0:00 ` Tom Moran 1999-03-11 0:00 ` Arthur Evans Jr 1999-03-11 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-09 0:00 ` SGI GNAT Question? (Long) dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` SpamSpamSpam 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` Chris Morgan 1999-03-10 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-10 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-07 0:00 ` David Botton 1999-03-07 0:00 ` robert_dewar 1999-03-05 0:00 ` bourguet 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-05 0:00 ` dewar 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Gautier 1999-03-02 0:00 ` David C. Hoos, Sr. 1999-03-02 0:00 ` GNAT discussions should be here as well kvisko 1999-03-02 0:00 ` dennison 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Mike Silva 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Larry Kilgallen 1999-03-02 0:00 ` Samuel Mize 1999-03-02 0:00 ` robert_dewar
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