Komodo in violation of Mozilla Public License?

phil hunt philh at comuno.freeserve.co.uk
Wed Apr 11 07:24:24 EDT 2001


On Tue, 10 Apr 2001 15:23:08 -0700, David Ascher <DavidA at ActiveState.com> wrote:
>   
>   Komodo is not Open Source or Free Software, true.

If i write some Python programs in Komodo, and then wish to modify
them in a system that doesn't include Komodo, will I have any problems?

(For example. many Java IDEs include a window-painting application
that lets you dynamically build GUIs, and generated Java code from
that. If you subsequently want to alter your GUI, you can either
use the same tool to alter it, or edit the generated Java code
directly (which means you can't subsequently use the tool to edit
your modifications)).

Does Komodo include a GUI painting application, if so, does it have
this caharacteristic?

The reason I ask is that I have been messed around by vendor lock-in
so many times in the past, that I refuse to use such code for anything,
unless there is no other product that does the job without lock-in.

Avoiding lock-in needn't prevent a software company from gaining
revenue from the sale-value of their software; a time-deleyed oepn 
source license allows both criteria to sit comfortably. Have
ActiveState considered that for Komodo, e.g. a license that releases
the current Komodo code as GPL (or some other license) in, say,
3 years' time?

>[...]
>   On the subject of whether Komodo "should", in a moral sense, be
>FSF-style free or not, I think we'll just have to agree to disagree. 

I personally have no problems with Komodo being released on a
non- Open Source license.

>You called me (I presume ironically) "free software/open source Python
>hero David Ascher".  I think some open source software is great.  I
>think some free software is great.  I also think that some closed-source
>software is great.  I tend to judge software based on whether the
>software meets the user's needs, and "fits" the user.

Me too.

And knowing that I'll still be able to use my software in the future,
when the company developing it has stopped supporting it, is important to
me. And that I can modify it to add new features.

-- 
*****[ Phil Hunt ***** philh at comuno.freeserve.co.uk ]*****
"Mommy, make the nasty penguin go away." -- Jim Allchin, MS head 
of OS development, regarding open source software (paraphrased).
               




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