Re: [gtk-list] Re: Gtk & Qt

[Andreas Kostyrka <andreas ag or at>]

On Sun, 12 Jul 1998, Joel Becker wrote:

> On Sat, 11 Jul 1998, Andreas Kostyrka wrote:
> 
> > > Public Licensed, GNU Library Public Licensed, or a third GPL like
> > > statement (it's shorter).  What makes it different from the GPL is that
> > > you cannot sell it and you CANNOT modify Qt.  A GPL'd library can be
> >
> > Which makes it incompatible with GPL/LGPL. Which doesn't matter perhaps
> 
> 	How?  Qt is not GPL.  Only your code is GPL.
Right. And that means that my code license is incompatible with Qt -> KDE.

> 	As for Kimp, Kemacs, and whatnot, I think it is pretty foolish to
> do so.  Spencer Kimball (one of the original authors of Gimp, for
It's foolish to allow for Qt. This the limitation is modify&distribute,
next time it's copy the binary.
(You know the saying: First they went for the Gay perverts, so I said
nothing; Then for the uncensored media, not being a journalist, I said
nothing; When they came for me, nobody was left to say something.)

If you allow any library to weaken your rights granted by GPL, than
anybody can just ignore the GPL, and treaten it basically as a BSD style
copyright. (Just write your library, and sell it instead of the GPLed
stuff.)

If the developers of Emacs, Gimp, etc. would have wanted this effect, they
would have choosen to distribute it under BSD style license. But they
choose GPL exactly to guard against such a case.

> those who don't know the name) made a very good argument. He felt that
> Kgimp, etc, would be a losing battle, trying to keep up with Gimp
> development.  He said that instead the KDE porters should patch Gimp so
> that there would be a --with-kde configure option, to compile KDE session
> support, etc, into the existing Gimp.
If they want to use Qt they still would need the consent of everybody who
is copyright holder of Gimp, and at least the FSF who holds some parts
will probably not consent.
But if they will be only using KDE LGPLed libraries that DO NOT depend
upon Qt (for example communication libraries) it is ok :)

> 	Myself, I don't use ANY KDE apps.  Just KDE itself as a window and
> session manager.  Why?  Because most of the KDE apps (like Gnome apps at
> this stage) are trivial, alpha, or both.  Gimp, Xemacs, Xfig, and all
> sorts of free software are out there.  And I refuse to limit my choice of
> software based on my choice of desktop, you know?
Very clever thing. No problem for the Gnome people, they allow you even to
run the KDE wm. (KDE on the other hand seems to want kwm. Don't know
what depends upon kwm, but it's own wm was in the orginal design of KDE.)

> 	You are correct, and we have already mentioned it here, that for
> base functionality, you would have to subclass EVERY class in C++.  For
> such things, it would be unfeasable.  I agree.  But that doesn't mean I
> shouldn't use the best window manager I have found (IMHO).
Again. The GNOME people have no problem with users using kwm :)

> 	I am not against Gnome.  I am upset by the people who are against
> KDE.  Or against anything.  If they do not like it, they do not have to
Ok. So you are upset about people that are trying to protect the freedom
of the not-yet-born Linux desktop.
So I presume you are also upset about people not being allowed to make
binary only distributions of the Linux kernel, and requiring a NDA to get
the source.

> use it.  I don't like scheme/lisp.  Do I tell people not to use it?  Nope.
Neither does Gnome force you to use it. Gnome allows you to use it.
(And guile has some language emulating libraries :) )
I myself am not a real Lisp freak, but Gnome people are usually quite
tolerant. (You know, being an open non-freak, I still have Gnome CVS write
access *gasp*)

> I just don't use it myself, except where I have to (.gtkrc, .gimprc :-).
Actually, the ideal way would be not to force you to edit the dot-files.
(That's the Gnome/KDE way: graphical configuration.)
And if you want really to edit it manually, then you should just consider
it another configuration format. (I'd expect any Unix user to have a very
adaptable configuration file processor unit in their brain.)

Andreas