Re: [ANNOUNCE] Introducing Codezero

Hi,

Sorry for the delayed reply, I have been doing some coding.

Jonathan Shapiro wrote:
>  
> What Sam is saying here -- but didn't actually state -- is that your 
> definition of "object based" doesn't agree with the rest of the field. 
> There is nothing wrong with the concept you are describing, but you 
> should find a more appropriate name for it.
>  

OK, by object-based I mean a CORBA-like distributed computing
architecture where object instances are defined on the server side, and
clients refer to those object instances by references to them (sometimes
by using their memory address as a key). In this model, the client uses
an interface definition language in order to generate boilerplated code
to access or refer to methods available on the remote object.

The key points here are that;

* Programing is done in object-oriented fashion.
* Objects are created, and accessed by *automated* methods such as an OO 
programming language, IDL compilers, stub generation etc.

 From what I understand, in the Hurd project a similar model is further
modified where a capability is associated with every object such
that, the capability reference is the only gateway to access an object.
With capabilities, every method of a given object is subject to security 
checking.

Re: [ANNOUNCE] Introducing Codezero

Hi,

On Wed, Aug 05, 2009 at 11:15:06AM +0300, Bahadir Balban wrote:

> OK, by object-based I mean a CORBA-like distributed computing
> architecture where object instances are defined on the server side,
> and clients refer to those object instances by references to them
> (sometimes by using their memory address as a key). In this model, the
> client uses an interface definition language in order to generate
> boilerplated code to access or refer to methods available on the
> remote object.
>
> The key points here are that;
>
> * Programing is done in object-oriented fashion.

> * Objects are created, and accessed by *automated* methods such as an
> OO  programming language, IDL compilers, stub generation etc.
[...]
> My idea in a nutshell is to remove the initially described methods of
> creating, managing, referring to objects, (as I find them to
> complicate design) and define ad-hoc, or loosely defined resources,
> but continue to protect them by capabilities. These resources can be
> thought of as objects, but only conceptually, rather than being
> created by automated tools such as an OO programming language or IDL
> compiler.
[...]
> But back to my conclusion with objects, in the above example model,
> instead of using automated methods of creating, referring, managing
> objects, the number of resources protected are reduced to a minimum

sustainable development

Re: sustainable development

On Fri, Aug 14, 2009 at 08:34:58PM -0400, steve paesani wrote:
> Hello,

Hi,

> I am new to L4-hurd development and would like to know
> where the original developers stand on commercial licensing.

I don't exactly know who you mean by "the original developers", and I
think I may not fall in that category, but I'll give you my opinion
anyway. 

> I think the micorkernel is neat and may work on it
> however I would like to use a 'dev'comp' license that affords
> that the software's development costs be compensated through
> sales. In short I would like to work on it with the knowing that I can
> market it and it's ensuing works.

I'm not sure what you're asking.  I'll answer a few options.  By "under
a non-free license" I mean it forbids using it for certain purposes, or
viewing the source, or redistributing, or modifying, or distributing the
modifications.  In other words, a license which does not grant all the
freedoms that software should have according to GNU.

A - You want to sell the microkernel itself under a non-free license: We
    will never allow that.
B - You want to change the microkernel and sell that version under a
    non-free license: We will not allow that either.
C - You want to write device drivers or other programs which are
    intimately linked to the microkernel design, and sell them under a
    non-free license: We will be unhappy about it, however I am unsure
    whether it is at all possible for us to forbid it.  Personally, I
    think I would not want to forbid it either (but I could change my
    mind on that).
D - You want to write applications or libraries which can run on the
    system and sell them under a non-free license: We will be unhappy
    about it, but unable to forbid it.

> I realize this goes against the idea of  free software

If you're talking about A or B, you are effectively saying "I want to
make money on your work; you're giving it away for free anyway, so it is
appearantly worthless to you".  This is (IMO) true for BSD-licensed
works.  However, when using the GPL, I want my work to be used for the
benefit of free software.  I invest my time so that the free software
community can grow and be stronger.  I'm not giving it away as worthless
junk; I'm giving it away as a present to people who want to be part of
my community.

This is why we will never allow the release of our software under a
non-free license: our work would be used against our cause.  We want to
make the world better, and invest time in it.  The software we create
shall not be used against us.  We choose a license to carefully forbid
that.

> however I also realize that not all things in life are free and
> developers need to get paid at some point for their work.

What a novel idea!  We should tell this to the free software community.
They probably never thought of this!

Seriously, I'm not going to answer this.  I'm sure you can find enough
flames on the subject by searching the web. 

Thanks,
Bas Wijnen

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Re: sustainable development

On Fri, Aug 14, 2009 at 08:34:58PM -0400, steve paesani wrote:
> I realize this goes against the idea of  free software however I also
> realize that not all things in life are free and developers need to get paid
> at some point for their work.

Maybe you could look at how EnterpriseDB or CommandPrompt operate.
They both base their business models on the Postgres database engine
and there seems to be a nice flow between their developers and
the non-commercial version.  Other companies like Greenplum have
(apparently) just taken the PG code for their own, but it doesn't seem
to have harmed the rest.

PG is BSD licensed which makes this different to Hurd, but it would
be interesting to see what you could do!  It seems important that the
main non-commercial version isn't under control of the commercial side
(i.e. Tom Lane at RedHat is probably the principle developer of PG at
the moment) but once you build up the right sort of community I'm not
sure how much it matters.

The commercial side needs to focus on the things the business users
perceive they need; support and compatibility seem to be the big ones.
The non-commercial side is much less well defined, but is normally
maintained by people who have an interest in technical things so you
should get a good flow of ideas about where to push from the commercial
side.

--

-- 
  Sam  http://samason.me.uk/

Re: sustainable development

Hi,

On Sat, Aug 15, 2009 at 03:40:19PM +0100, Sam Mason wrote:

> Maybe you could look at how EnterpriseDB or CommandPrompt operate.

EnterpriseDB is proprietary software; please don'n recommend it here.

CommandPrompt seems to be fine though -- another nice example of a
successful free software company 

-antrik-

Re: sustainable development

On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 09:21:07AM +0200, olafBuddenhagen <at> gmx.net wrote:
> On Sat, Aug 15, 2009 at 03:40:19PM +0100, Sam Mason wrote:
> > Maybe you could look at how EnterpriseDB or CommandPrompt operate.
> 
> EnterpriseDB is proprietary software; please don'n recommend it here.

Interesting response and not a great way to build community, how about
giving me the benefit of the doubt?

I mentioned them because they run a commercial organization that
contributes a lot to the free software world--I didn't mean to recommend
their non-free version of PG.  They employ a large number of the core
contributors to Postgres and this seems like a good thing to me.  The
fact that they have to support these developers by selling a non-free
version just seems to be a reflection of the current market to me.

> CommandPrompt seems to be fine though -- another nice example of a
> successful free software company 

Please be aware that "nice" here is very loaded with your conceptions of
what a "good" software company should be.  I'm not saying it's good or
bad, just to be aware that you're making some pretty broad statements.

BTW, I'm in academia so it's in my interest to be open and release
things, other entities have other goals and I wouldn't want to impinge
upon them unless they were forcing their desires on me.

--

-- 
  Sam  http://samason.me.uk/