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OS/2, eCS & ArcaOS - Technical => Programming => Topic started by: Martin Iturbide on April 25, 2014, 11:08:01 pm

Title: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 25, 2014, 11:08:01 pm
Hi

I talked to the author of "Animated Mouse Pointer" and he gave me the source code of this program. He wants to release it as Open Source under the Apache license, but he gave me the condition that to be released a new build has to be created with the new license.

I need someone that can help me to compile Animated Mouse Pointer and release a new version binary, so all the package, binaries and source code can be released.

I really need help with this. Since it is taking me forever to understand how to compile this software.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Paul Smedley on April 25, 2014, 11:58:54 pm
Hi

I talked to the author of "Animated Mouse Pointer" and he gave me the source code of this program. He wants to release it as Open Source under the Apache license, but he gave me the condition that to be released a new build has to be created with the new license.

I need someone that can help me to compile Animated Mouse Pointer and release a new version binary, so all the package, binaries and source code can be released.

I really need help with this. Since it is taking me forever to understand how to compile this software.

Regards

Martin, per chat on IRC, I'm happy to take a look.....
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 26, 2014, 01:55:28 am
Thanks Paul. I just sent it to you e-mail.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Eugene Gorbunoff on April 26, 2014, 11:03:27 am
Animated mouse pointers were opensourced, updated and debugged several years ago:
http://ecomstation.ru/amptr
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on April 26, 2014, 12:18:26 pm
Eugene++, although I don't understand the mentioned requirement of eCoRT-Base.
I think the mentioned build of Animated Mouse Pointer should be tested against what exactly DLL of these:
Code: [Select]
appman.dll   │   34767│15.07.11│ 6:37a
ecobase.dll  │   18659│05.11.13│ 5:50a
ecoCalc.dll  │   25287│25.04.11│ 1:59p
ecolange.dll │   73140│30.10.13│ 8:09a
ecomedia.dll │  279794│05.03.14│ 6:23a
ecoxml.dll   │   91603│07.06.10│ 6:36p
esqlite3.dll │  535885│10.07.13│ 1:26p
esysinfo.dll │   93179│28.11.12│ 3:10p
ezip.dll     │ 2720590│20.01.14│11:36a
gostciph.dll │    4173│28.08.02│12:28a
ptrace.dll   │   20062│05.11.13│ 6:01a
rxgost.dll   │   42783│17.09.02│ 6:03p
sysglit.dll  │    8422│19.08.09│12:37a
wowpack.dll  │   71827│19.08.09│12:47a
is it linked with, and rebuild it without such a requirement, because neither of these DLLs are open source.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 26, 2014, 06:27:50 pm
Hi Eugene.

Thanks for letting me know. What about open sourcing eCo Software runtime?

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andreas Schnellbacher on April 26, 2014, 10:52:06 pm
Thanks Paul. I just sent it to you e-mail.

I have most likely the same dev env as Christian (mainly VAC 3.08). It
should not be much effort for me to compile AMPtr with access to the
sources.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on April 27, 2014, 03:18:21 pm
Thanks Paul. I just sent it to you e-mail.

I have most likely the same dev env as Christian (mainly VAC 3.08). It
should not be much effort for me to compile AMPtr with access to the
sources.
Sources from Eugene Gorbunoff, direct link (http://ru.ecomstation.ru/projects/amptr/files.php?e=2).
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andreas Schnellbacher on April 27, 2014, 11:33:52 pm
Sources
from Eugene Gorbunoff, direct link (http://ru.ecomstation.ru/projects/amptr/files.php?e=2).

The zip file is not complete. At least the files of the subdirs are
missing. It contains Christian's OSS license but unfortunately
requires eco libs that are not OSS, AFAIK. It looks to me impossible
to release stuff like that with an OSS license, even when the changes
might be useful:

From the contained file whatsnew.txt:

14/07/2010 Yuri A.Prokushev
- resource dll build fixed
- GPL version

19.10.2009 Yuri A.Prokushev
- WarpIn packaging
- LANGE support

14.10.2009 Dmitry A.Steklenev
- The sources now can be compiled via VAC 3.0 and 3.6.
- The size of the stack of the executables is increased. This prevents
  crash of the aniedit2.exe.
- Prevents permanently disabling the "Edit" button in case user try to
  edit an animated pointer.
- The properties notebook now have "merlin" style.
- Prevents of emphasis of NULL container record during context menu
  activation.
- Fixed incorrect allocation of the HANDLERDATAINTERNAL structure.
- Optimized container drawing in the demo mode.
- Fixed "hide pointer" feature.
- Removed a lot of unused variables.
- All structures are aligned to 32-bit boundary and all
  DosEnterCritSec/DosExitCritSec calls are removed.

Andreas
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: ivan on April 28, 2014, 03:59:51 pm
Is what Eugene is doing - linking in code and not supplying the source for that code - even legal under the GPL licence?
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Dave Yeo on April 28, 2014, 04:43:13 pm
Is what Eugene is doing - linking in code and not supplying the source for that code - even legal under the GPL licence?

Most consider it to not be complying with the license. I don't think it has ever been argued in court and may vary in different jurisdictions.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on April 28, 2014, 05:27:36 pm
Uh-huh, ic the only req'd lib from ecort is lange, so may it be removed by diffing the sources Martin will, I hope, provide, and Gorbunoff's ones, and then just finding and removing all lange-related changes from the diff?

I assume, two evenings?
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Eugene Gorbunoff on April 28, 2014, 05:46:49 pm
OK.. this thread demonstrates current state of os2world.com site.

Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 28, 2014, 06:08:23 pm
Thanks Andreas. I had sent you the source code to your email.

About the licensing. I don't know under which conditions did the original author gave the source code to Eugene. I can not know if it is legal or not.

Dave, Ivan. Eugene released the derivative work under LGPL (GNU Lesser General Public License) (NOT GPL). If Eugene got permission from the original author to make it LGPL, what he is doing (linking it to Non-GPL software) is legal as I understand that license as far as I know.  It will be interesting to know from LGPL which licenses can you use to make derivative work.

In this case the original author gave me permission to release it under the Apache V2 license, which also opens the door that it derivate works can be turned to GNU GPL, since it is compatible. (but you can not go back from GPL to Apache).

But I prefer a more open source implementation of "Animated Mouse Pointer" that does not depend on "eCo Software runtime" , since it is a close source library.  I believe that if we remain using eComStation-OS2 until today is because open source has allow us to migrate more software to this platform. We should not produce more close source software that in the future will have the risk to became abandonware, like all the old OS/2 software we have.

Regards.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on April 28, 2014, 06:09:06 pm
OK.. this thread demonstrates current state of os2world.com site.
I really like the current state of os2world.com. And I don't like the complete indifference to GNU GPLv2 violation by you that you demonstrate. Fixed. Was unproven.

But I prefer a more open source implementation of "Animated Mouse Pointer" that does not depend on "eCo Software runtime" , since it is a close source library.  I believe that if we remain using eComStation-OS2 until today is because open source has allow us to migrate more software to this platform. We should not produce more close source software that in the future will have the risk to became abandonware, like all the old OS/2 software we have.
I agree to every word.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 28, 2014, 06:12:53 pm
Hi Boris.

<personal opinion>I don't think that Eugene is violating the GPL license (since he is not using it, he is using LGPL), He is just simple a bad open source citizen since he is closing source code and linking it to close source. There is no law against it. </personal opinion>

Let's stop this discussion and let's help the OS/2 community to get more source code and more open source software.

I really need to have this software compiling to release the source code to the public as it should be.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on April 28, 2014, 06:15:36 pm
AFAIK, no, you can't link closed-source code to GPL code.
If Eugene has got the source under LGPL, then there is really no problem (excluding the moral one).
I've fixed my post.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andreas Schnellbacher on April 28, 2014, 07:08:31 pm
Thanks Andreas. I had sent you the source code to your email.
Received. I'll try it in the next days, hopefully. Apparently Christian used TVFS, but that should not be a greater problem.

About the license: I didn't know that it was someone of the eco developers, who added the LPGL to the code. Comparing it with Martin's version made that clear.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Dave Yeo on April 29, 2014, 02:52:37 am
I was also unclear that the license was not GPL, which is only allowed to be linked to system libraries.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andy Willis on April 30, 2014, 01:30:45 am
I was also unclear that the license was not GPL, which is only allowed to be linked to system libraries.

While the eco-runtime was not part of OS/2, it was distributed I believe with at least one version of eCS so it can be argued it is a system library so whether LGPL (which I consider a free as in speech license) or GPL (free as in beer license) it would meet the requirements.  Apache license is good (free speech license).
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andi B. on April 30, 2014, 09:47:06 am
Quote
...I believe with at least one version of eCS so it can be argued it is a system library...
I would say no. I'm pretty sure lot of eCS systems do not have it installed. No system component relies on it. Lot of users do not let ecosoft libs install during system installation. The number of ecosoft libraries and functionality changed a lot between eCS versions. No clue which version and what components were delivered with different eCS versions though.

IMHO if eCS apps want to make use of features from ecosoft libs they should check if available on system and if not work without these functionality. As I did with DataSeeker. It's as easy as a few lines of code. No serious application should depend on them given the great OS/2 - eCS user base who don't have/don't want to have these libs on their system. 

At this point in eCS - OS/2 development we should not invest in any closed source part anymore. If anyone want to work on Animated Mouse Pointer again I would advice take the last sources and rip out dependencies or make an own version based on Christians sources and merge the few fixes made since then.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 30, 2014, 03:26:25 pm

While the eco-runtime was not part of OS/2, it was distributed I believe with at least one version of eCS so it can be argued it is a system library so whether LGPL (which I consider a free as in speech license) or GPL (free as in beer license) it would meet the requirements.  Apache license is good (free speech license).
[/quote]

Hi Andy

I just to not get confuse "eCo Software runtime" it is not open source, not under GPL, not even under LGPL. "eCo Software runtime" is "AS IS" freeware like it says on its page (http://en.ecomstation.ru/projects/developer/toolkit/?action=contacts).

I disagreed on you personal opinion calling GPL "Free as in beer". I understand that FSF sometimes gives a too much philosophical meaning to its license, but what the GPL does is force the derivate works to be also open under the same GPL license. Which I think that is positive to projects that needs to grow and snowball, especially software that is "commodity" or base for other things like an operating system. I think that Linux has grown thanks to that license, otherwise (if it will be under Apache) companies will make forks of it under different licenses and even close the source. GPL is not good or bad, it's just a license mode that may fit some needs or not.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on April 30, 2014, 04:54:25 pm
...ok, I will turn philosophical  ;D

I remember back some years ago, since I was influenced by IBM, I didn't like the GPL license at all. I preferred the Apache license since it allowed the developer to have more freedom on what to do with the derivative work. Also BSD since it allow you to do whatever you want with the derivative work

But on this same forum somebody explain me a good reason to use GPL. A developer may have the dream for his work to be open no matter if it has little or much derivative work on it. A way to guarantee that dream of the developer is to have a license that will force the derivative work to be open too under the same freedom of sharing conditions. That moment is what I understood that some developers don't want money, don't want fame, they only wanted to share their wisdom and hoped that his software will be useful for somebody.

When you check an open source license you don't see only the "freedom" of the developer. GPL is the license that respect the freedom of the user, to not be hi-jacked by a single developer or company, and to not be hi-jacked by a developer that offers the same open source software with improved icons and better marketing.

I prefer any open source license approved by Opensource.org, but I also started to respect GNU GPL some years ago.  Specially on this community when we need development to "add up" and not be divided by companies or individuals that only focus on personal gain.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andreas Schnellbacher on April 30, 2014, 08:55:16 pm
What remains is that

1) The file wpamptrsrc-20100704.zip apparently doesn't include the entire sources.

2) The OSS license of this package is LPGL and not GPL.

3) It links a closed source lib. for NLS.

4) It looks to me as if both Christian's and eco's methods for NLS can't be used simultaneously.

5) I wonder that Christian hasn't used his Hypertext/2 for IPF file creation, for which I created the version 2.00 as a large update with many fixes. Apparently AMPtrs was released before HText.

Andreas
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: ivan on May 01, 2014, 12:51:14 am
The reason I raised the question of the license was because of the  whatsnew.txt file Andreas posted which said, in part:

Quote
14/07/2010 Yuri A.Prokushev
- resource dll build fixed
- GPL version

It does say GPL not LGPL  but it appears that is a mute point now.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on May 02, 2014, 03:47:43 pm
Hi Ivan

You are right about this confusion, inside the "whatsnew.txt" file it says GPL, on the site it says LGPL. On the source code (.c files) of the site it says  "GNU Lesser General Public". So I guess that version was released as LGPL of the original author.

But I prefer as a first step to try to recompile the original source code, release the source code as Apache as it was requested by the author to me and make it public.

At the end we will have two versions of the source code.
1) Once released as LGPL and with dependencies of the closed source eCo Runtime.
2) Other one as Apache with the original source code as the author release it.

Andreas, thanks for your help, please let me know any progress.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: dbanet on May 02, 2014, 08:54:37 pm
Other one as Apache with the original source code as the author release it.

I do not agree with u fully. I think there's a need to merge the changes made by eCoSoft, except the ones that add requirements of eCoRT.

Anyway it is better to release the code without the changes merged (so, just fix building, and build), than to leave the source code unreleased, because then someone, e. g. me, will be able to merge the changes.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on May 02, 2014, 09:15:39 pm
Hi Boris.

The author gave me permission to release it under Apache license.

If there is a way an Apache license can derivate to LGPL, there is a way to merge them together and possible the result will be LGPL. But I need to find out if the Apache license allows that.
I know that you can take something from the Apache license and make it GPL (and not the other way), but I don't know if it works the same with LGPL.

More information, links and suggestion are welcome.

Regards
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on May 02, 2014, 09:26:41 pm
Some discussion said it is possible to go from Apache to LGPL (http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1174240/apache-and-lgpl-license-compatibility).

But I need to comply with the authors will to make a Apache release, after that derivative work can be LGPL, GPL and can even be merged to eCo modified version under LGPL.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Andreas Schnellbacher on May 02, 2014, 09:54:53 pm
BTW: Christian has released his more recent projects under the GPL version 2.

About progress: I found Christian's files.txt, in which he gives hints about the build process. I tried it a first time with VAC 3.08 instead of IBMCPP 2.1 and it fails, of course.  (I have both available.) Also the toolkit version is involved.

Let's see if it's more work to switch compiler and toolkit or to activate the older environment. Additionally, tools need refreshing, as Christian already described.

Andreas
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Dave Yeo on May 03, 2014, 04:42:49 am
Hi Boris.

The author gave me permission to release it under Apache license.

If there is a way an Apache license can derivate to LGPL, there is a way to merge them together and possible the result will be LGPL. But I need to find out if the Apache license allows that.
I know that you can take something from the Apache license and make it GPL (and not the other way), but I don't know if it works the same with LGPL.

More information, links and suggestion are welcome.

Regards

The authour(s) can always relicense code how ever they like so if Eugene is OK with his changes being relicensed... Anyways can't hurt to ask.
Title: Re: Animated Mouse Pointer - Need Development Help
Post by: Martin Iturbide on May 03, 2014, 05:38:46 pm
Hi Dave

I know that, but first I want to have someone able to recompile it.  Apache is a very liberal license that can allows derivative works on LGPL and GPL, so I'm fine with it. Or I can even ask the author to relicense. But right now I want to have a way to recompile it and release it to the public.

Regards