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Wine Software

Debian And WineX 282

Posted by Hemos from the i-wanna-install dept.
fdsa writes "After a heated debate, and under some pressure by TransGaming, an 'intent to package' WineX from sourceforge CVS for (non-free) Debian has been withdrawn. The message provides a good summary of the recent Wine chaos, and notes how WineX is effectively under a different license than stated. Here's a mail from their CEO Gavriel State on the issue."
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Debian And WineX More

Debian And WineX

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  • Gentoo Linux (Score:5, Informative)

    by delta407 ( 518868 ) <slashdot@l[ ]jhax.com ['erf' in gap]> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:30PM (#3596566) Homepage

    Amusingly, Gentoo Linux [gentoo.org] users can install WineX with a single command. It is packaged (I assume) from the Sourceforge CVS, and given that Gentoo compiles everything from scratch, conveniently sidesteps the whole distributing binaries thing.

    By the way, for fellow Gentoo users, a 2002/05/11 ebuild is currently available by "# emerge winex". Check the package list [gentoo.org] for the most recent date.

    • Debian - Gentoo (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It seems that most Gentoo users are ex-Debian and ex-Slackware users who got fed up with all the bureaucracy and stagnation of these distros. After using Debian for some 5 years I can say that my machine is really happy with Gentoo, while it was pretty scared with Debian.

      I'm not saying that to flame any distro, I'd just like to point to Debian and Slackware users there is another decent way to follow.
      • You're not the only one who took this path. Gentoo works great! :-)

      • Re:Debian - Gentoo (Score:1, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        That may be true but I would extend your statement to:

        It seems that most Gentoo users are ex-Debian and ex-Slackware newbies and hobby users who got fed up with all the bureaucracy and stagnation of these distros.

        If you're seriously using your desktop for development and general purpose use then you understand the importance of not wasting time fiddling around waiting to compile stuff. And then you have the wasted time when something doesn't compile (at all or incorrectly). Doing all that is for people who like to just play with their systems and mess around doing different stuff. The other side to that is using Linux as a busisness desktop and development machine.

        The *BSD's get away with the ports system because most of the time it is admins who are setting up servers and it is their job to sit there and fiddle with things until they work.
      • This isn't a troll; this is serious.


        Why bother? It seems kind of odd to create another distribution whose purpose is to mimic the bsd's. Why not just use one?


        hawk

        • See the Gentoo Linux FAQ [gentoo.org]:

          Why write a new port system (Portage) instead of using BSD's version?

          In one sentence, because Portage is much better in so many ways. One of the design philosophies of the .ebuild syntax was to make it an analog of what you'd type to install the program manually, thus making Portage very easy to learn and modify to your needs. We also have OpenBSD-style "fake" installs, safe unmerging, system profiles, package masking, a real dependency system, and lots of other good stuff.

    • Re:Gentoo Linux (Score:3, Insightful)

      by athakur999 ( 44340 )
      That's one the advantages of the ports-style system Gentoo uses. The ebuilds are just instructions on how to download and compile a package, they don't contain any actual source code or binaries. Thus Gentoo can have an ebuild for virtually any program, regardless of what license the program is under.
    • Absolutly, another ex-slackware user here. Gentoo has been amazing. I just simply love it. I have never actually been a "cheerleader" for any single distro, but if I had to, gentoo has my support.

  • Diary of a CMU CS Student (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:30PM (#3596568)
    This past year, I was accepted into Carnegie Mellon's [cmu.edu] School of Computer Science [cmu.edu]. It has been a remarkable experience that I would lik e to share with the Slashdot community. Here's an account of my experience.

    Week 1, Sunday: I moved in today. My roommate, a sophomore CS student, had already moved in tw o days before me. The floor is already completely covered with garbage. He also smells. I think he might be gay too. He's already asked me if I like the color he painted his toenails. This should be interesting. I am almost completely settled in. Techno music is playing in every room in every floor of my dorm. There are computers and other types of trash out in the common areas. What a mess. Tom orrow, I am going to go sign up to get my network connection.

    Week 1, Monday: I got hooked up to the CMU network today! I jacked into the network, only to f ind that the hostname and address assigned to me were colliding with another system. I'll just increm ent the network numbers a few times. I am really eager to get on.

    Week 1, Tuesday: I am still looking for a free IP address. Can't anybody here properly configu re their systems?

    Week 1, Friday: I finally found a free IP! It's mine! You sons of bitches can't have i t, I found it, I keep it, it's mine! To hell with all of you! Head hurts really bad. I've slowly be en developing a headache since I first arrived. Everywhere I look there are these Lucent Technologies wireless access points. I wonder if that's the problem.

    Week 1, Saturday: I sat down at my computer today. My desktop wall paper is now the goatse.cx guy. Pleasant. Scattered over every directory on my C: drive are thousands, possibly millions, of fi les titled "J00AR30WN3DBITCH-phj33r-" and then some random hacker's name. Don't these people have liv es? Maybe they need laid or something. It'd take days to clean this out. I mentioned to my roommate that I needed to reinstall Windows, and immediately he jumped up and shouted: "NO! Do NOT use Window s!" Suddenly, two dozen other guys (all of them possibly homosexuals) appeared at the door, each tout ing an operating system called Linux. Half of them got into a fight over which was better, Debian, Re dHat, Slackware, and a bunch of others I couldn't recognize. Some kid who appeared to not have shower ed since he was born was touting "Linux From Scratch", saying that only losers used pre-made distros. A crowd of people in the back kept quiet about how I'd be sorry if I used Linux instead of BSD on the network. Who the fuck are these people? Classes start next week. Hope I have my computer working s o I can do my assignments.

    Week 3, Friday: People are still trying to get Linux to work on my system. They keep telling m y that my hardware sucks. We go through about four or five distributions a day. Every now and then, I notice a little devil on my screen. Stickers for every of these distributions have been plastered o n my case. Suddenly, my room stinks a lot more with these people in here. I ask them why they never shower, and the usual response is something along the lines of "showering is like rebooting" and "I do n't want to lose my uptime."

    Week 3, Saturday: There's a troop of men running naked in a circle around McGill Hall. I am no t even going to ask.

    Week 4, Wednesday: Linux is FINALLY working on my computer! I have a pretty slick desktop too. I think I might like this. I can finally work in my room instead of the labs, although considering the every increasing layer of garbage on the floor...

    Week 4, Thursday: My computer flashes messages about how I am "0WNX0RED" and how I should "PHJ3 3R" whoever and how "L4MEX0R" I am for having an insecure box. A kid suggests we reinstall Linux afte r discovering about 17 rootkits.

    Week 5, Friday: Someone got BSD working on my computer. I wonder if this will last. The stres s has been building and I forgot to take a shower this morning.

    Week 6, Tuesday: Seems I have been "0WNX0R3D" again. Took longer this time. Minutes later, so meone comes in with a "Bastile Linux" install CD. He gets started installing. I am feeling very susp icious of these guys.

    Week 6, Thursday: Everyone seems to know more about my system than I do. It's a bit unnerving. I guess anyone could feel upset from this sort of treatment. They hack my box, trash it, then reins tall everything. I guess they think they're being funny. My dirty clothes are piling up and I am out of clean ones. I don't have time to do laundry, I'll have to wear something out of the pile.

    Week 6, Friday: I got up this morning, sat at my machine, and stared at it blankly. An icon ap peared on my desktop for Quake III. I suppose it couldn't hurt to play some. I have been very stress ed lately.

    Week 6, Sunday: I lost track of time! I started playing Quake III on the network with some oth er CMU students (who killed me hundreds of times in the course of 10 minutes) and completely lost myse lf. There's a bag of chips that has been sitting here for a few weeks. I think I'll finish those off for breakfast and then go to sleep.

    Week 7, Wednesday: I masturbate every day now. Not a single girl comes near me. This is so de pressing. Do I really smell? Oh well, I have the task of learning how to secure my Linux box to keep me busy. Who has time for the opposite sex after all?

    Week 8, Tuesday: I got into a fight with this little shit who kept telling me RedHat was great. What a fucking moron! Anybody who knows Linux knows that Debian kicks its sorry little ass. I'll b e getting my judiciary papers for the incident in the mail. Doesn't this school get it? I can't let someone go around converting people to RedHat! WtF!?

    Week 8, Friday: My roommate squeezed my ass today! At first I was shocked and appauled, and I told him off for it. Thinking about it later though, there was just something that seemed too strong about my reaction. I'll talk to him later and appologize for getting so upset, it wasn't really so ba d.

  • True definition of "Open Source" (Score:2, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward
    If you read the entire Open Source initiative statement, you'll understand that Open Source is just a fancy name for proprietary licenses. Yea, there are some guidlines that must be met but they are a mile wide, so when someone says they are "Open Source", you really have to read their license, because it could be just about anything.

    GPL all the way, baby. You know what you're getting every time.

  • Ouch (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Dopefish_1 ( 217994 ) <slashdot AT thedopefish DOT com> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:32PM (#3596586) Homepage
    2. " We would prefer not to have to change our license to explicitly prevent the distribution of binary packages, but if we have to we will do so."
    Sounds like a pretty dirty move by Transgaming, if you ask me.

  • One argument for the GPL and against "look alikes" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by chill ( 34294 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:33PM (#3596590) Journal
    If you want it to be truely free, use the GPL license. If you don't care, then use the BSD, Artistic, X11 or what-have-you. This is a good example of what can happen.

    This is why I bought a PlayStation 2 -- NOTHING is free, and I don't expect any of it to be, so I'm not disappointed. I can just sit down and PLAY GAMES without making moral decisions.
    • yeah, but most people don't want to spend an additional $250+ for a game system (including necessary attachments) when they have a $1000+ one sitting at home (plus most of these people pirate the damn games anyway ;)

      I agree w/you wholeheartedly, but most will not.

    • Re:One argument for the GPL and against "look alik (Score:5, Insightful)

      by psavo ( 162634 ) <psavo@iki.fi> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:52PM (#3596723) Homepage
      If you want it to be truely free, use the GPL license. If you don't care, then use the BSD, Artistic, X11 or what-have- you. This is a good example of what can happen.

      I think you don't understand.
      To be 'truely' free you should use BSD license. It basically gives your code away.
      Those of us who use GPL do it to get back some fruits of our hands. I WANT that any of my modified code will come back to me.
      I think BSD people are very generous, but I personally don't think I could just give my work away the way they do.

      • Re:One argument for the GPL and against "look alik (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:56PM (#3597236)
        That does sound nice but a software project is a dynamic thing, evolving over time. Your scenerio is static, a happy snapshot where you're giving your code away and all is nice.

        Lets look at the dynamic:

        1.) Start project, license it as BSD
        2.) Writing code, everything is nice.
        3.) Code becomes popular, sizable group of developers gather.
        4.) The vampires show up. Act just like regular users at first.
        5.) Vampires start making making requests for you to change certain things, so their fork will work better. They promise to release patche sback to you.
        6.) More vampires show up, make the same demands and promises as the proginal vampire.
        7.) Your mailing list starts filling up with requests from developers who think it would be best for the project if you cooperated with vampire(x).
        8.) None of the vampires have kept their promises. DEvelopers for you project are working on vampire forks.
        9.) Your project is no longer popular because it has fewer features than the vampire forks. AFter all the vampire forks will always be their efforts+theirs. you can never keep up.
        10.) People on your mailing list start to bitch and moan about not having feature X that they saw in vampire distro.
        11.)Vampires continue to orbit. Plucking any new idea you have and not giving anything in return. Project dies a slow death and you get tired of working with it because it's not fun anymore.

      • Finally, a GPLer who gets it! Thank you.

        Those of us who use the BSD license do so simply because we wish to give/share our software. We don't want to compell anyone to return the favor. It's a no-strings-attached deal.

        We realize that not everyone will agree with us, but that's not why we're doing it. People who do wish some sort of a guarantee that mods come back to them should not use the BSD license, because that's not what it's about.

        p.s. BSD vs GPL is rather like an anarcho-capitalist arguing with an anarcho-socialist over the nature of liberty.
      • I think you don't understand.
        To be 'truely' free you should use BSD license.

        No. I think you are confused with the wording. If you want your code to be "free" in the sense that your code's distribution and development can never be restricted, then use the (L)GPL. If you want to give away your code for free (no strings attached), then use the BSDL.

        • No. I think you are confused with the wording. If you want your code to be "free" in the sense that your code's distribution and development can never be restricted, then use the (L)GPL. If you want to give away your code for free (no strings attached), then use the BSDL.

          BSD advocate's base their usage of free on these definitions (Webster):

          2 a : not determined by anything beyond its own nature or being : choosing or capable of choosing for itself b : determined by the choice of the actor or performer c : made, done, or given voluntarily or spontaneously
          4 a : having no trade restrictions b : not subject to government regulation c of foreign exchange : not subject to restriction or official control
          5 a : having no obligations (as to work) or commitments b : not taken up with commitments or obligations

          RMS bases his Free on:

          3 a : relieved from or lacking something unpleasant or burdensome

          Given the subjective usage of unpleasant/burdensome, I like the BSD advocate's usage better and believe that RMS should find a description that makes his intentions more clear. Perhaps something like Forever Free Software.
          • Given the subjective usage of unpleasant/burdensome, I like the BSD advocate's usage better and believe...

            Why must you conclude that one is better? Why not just accept the differences and move on? And, if you are going to state that one is better, could you at least justify it with a logical inference or something?

            • I already pointed out that Free is based on a subjective interpretation of the word free. It only works for a certain moral code which is clearly not shared by everyone. This creates confusion. That's why I'm not afraid to say that RMS choice of Free sucks. Language is about making things clear, not about overloading common words with new specific meanings.

              No one can be confused that the BSD license is freer by definitions 2, 4 and 5 from my previous post. I happen to feel that BSD-licensed code is also more free in the sense that it lacks something unpleasant or burdensome. I can actually choose the license for my own code, even when it's linked to a BSD'd component. Others may disagree, but that disagreement is a good reason not to use the word free when we talk about this distinction between the two licenses. A term like Forever Free Software would be much clearer.
    • The only "truly free" license is no license; ie public domain. The GPL is great, it's clever, it works. But just like a Microsoft EULA, it imposes restrictions.
      • Actually, it does NOT impose restrictions. It takes away some restrictions (from standard copyright law) and leaves some in. Public domain removes all restrictions, GPL removes SOME restrictions, MS EULA adds MANY restrictions.

      • Re:One argument for the GPL and against "look alik (Score:2, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward
        Until you have read both the GPL and a Microsoft EULA, you should refrain from comparing the two. The fact that both have titles containing the word "License" is just about all they have in common.

        The GPL is a copyright license; unless you plan to modify and redistribute a GPLed work, you don't even have to worry about it. Its terms are intended to make sure that others maintain the same freedom to modify and redistribute that you received and were pleased to take advantage of.

        Microsoft's EULA is a usage license, attempting to impose conditions ex post facto on your use of a product you paid for. You are not able to read the license until after the purchase has been made, and its terms are crafted for the benefit of Microsoft and Microsoft alone.

        Thus the GPL and the EULA could scarcely be more different in the letter of their conditions, the spirit of their conditions, and the manner in which those conditions are applied.

        AC.


    • "This is why I bought a PlayStation 2 -- NOTHING is free, and I don't expect any of it to be, so I'm not disappointed. I can just sit down and PLAY GAMES without making moral decisions."

      You also have a system which is very good at playing games. The controller feels better than a keyboard, crashes are incredibly rare, the games are running on known hardware so there are no surprises (speed/driver/whatever issues), and the boot/shutdown time is almost instant.

      Most of the games I want to play (I'm into RPGs) are on consoles anyway. Although I refuse to buy an Xbox to play the current Oddworld installment (grr). Amusingly, the only games I play on my PC (besides xscorch) are with console emulators :)

      That said, Windows emulation does have some uses other than gaming...but then, gaming is what most of WineX's changes benefit.

  • What's the big deal? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by pyros ( 61399 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:33PM (#3596597) Journal
    I think the CEO's email makes their concern quite clear. They acknowledge that the current license can't prevent anyone from making a debian package. I think he's presented quite a reasonable argument for third parties re-packaging their code. What it doesn't address is why they don't make debian packages themselves. (please forgive me if they do, I don't use any flavor of Wine, and the CEO's email seemes to imply they don't, and have canceled plans to do so.)
    • If the CEO is so clear on why they don't want third parties to package and redistribute, why didn't they state this in the license in the first place? I'm sure there was no harm meant by the Debian packager, they just read the license and apparently it said that it was OK.

      What's the point of making pseudo free license if you don't really mean it? Was the idea to get more free software developer, and as soon as anyone used the benefits of free software they backed off saying "hey will change the license if you do that"!?

      If their business model is one that could be harmed by the Debian packages and not benefit from them I don't see the point in allowing it in the license.
    • Transgaming offers binary packages (RPM, deb and tgz) to subscribers only. These packages have the copy-protection, an updated InstallShield core, and a few other things that they licensed themselves. For non subscribers, they have their public Sourceforge CVS tree. No source package, no binary package, only raw CVS source.

      I don't think they'll stop the (subscriber's) debian package: there's no reason to do so.

      If you'd like to compare, the LGPL'd Wine (the official branch) offers CVS source tree and about a release a month, packaged as a tgz (source only). Some other individuals (see WineHQ [winehq.org] for a small list) package it and distribute binaries.

    • Re:What's the big deal? (Score:2, Informative)

      by n-tropy ( 98354 )
      I personaly have a winex subscription and run debian. They have debian packages and I don't mind having to download and install them manualy. Helping to pay for development and being able to use my votes to make an impact into what they are wokring on next is good. I enjoy playing JKII under linux and am going to install SOF II shortly. If they could just get dungeon siege working i won't have to boot to windows until the next good game is released and only until Transgaming fixes winex to support it.

    • Re:What's the big deal? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by FatlXception ( 458604 ) <[gro.pi-on.noitpecxltaf] [ta] [hsals]> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:20PM (#3596917) Homepage
      They do distribute debian DEB packages along with the RPM's, but of course, these are the full, stable releases, which include non-free code like copy protection, and which you must be a subscriber to download. They're worried that if Debian distributes the compiled CVS version and calls it WineX, people who install that package may think that's all there is, without being aware of the subscription service or the extra features possible. Personally, I agree with them, and don't see what all the fuss is about. I don't see a 'big bad company' trying to muscle out the 'little guy', I see a group trying to support open source development financially, and trying to protect their interests in doing so. If you read Gavriel State's response, I think their position is perfectly reasonable.
      • I don't see a 'big bad company' trying to muscle out the 'little guy'...

        I kinda have been seeing it as the little guy trying to push out the big guys. I'm no M$ fan but if their license is worse (which it's not, but people are thinking it is getting that way) then there is no point.

        They are in the right.
    • I for one rarely if ever give a crap about playing Windows games under Linux, but this is a big deal to me because the CEO is making a [public, no less] threat to try and control what someone else (Debian) does. And what they legally have every right to do.

      What inexcusable about this behavior is that it's a strongarm play. You don't have to use any flavor of WINE to see that, and you don't have to contribute any code for it to affect you.

      Extortion is wrong, period, regardless of the context and regardless of one's Favorite Approved Licenses.

  • Finances Vs. Software (Score:3, Insightful)

    by coryboehne ( 244614 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:35PM (#3596611)
    From the E-Mail "If Debian goes ahead and packages WineX despite our request, we will have to evaluate how
    that is affecting our financial situation, and determine whether we should change our
    license to restrict any future binary-packaged redistribution, regardless of commercial or
    non-commercial intent. It would certainly be our preference not to have to do so."

    You know, as I recall there once was a day when projects such as these were more concerned with producing great software rather than profit margins. Unfortunatly it does take money to run a business, and in order to keep it viable so that you can continue to create great software you have to be able to finance the development process. Still I almost feel sad for some reason.
    • In this particular case, it's not a matter of profit. It's a matter of existence, if you take their last stated number of subscribes (~3,000) x $5 US or so a month, that's hardly enough month to support several full time developers, and pay for rent on a space, etc.

      It's sad that people don't understand this. They just want everything free. Somehow, someway Transgaming has to be able to recoup the costs of development.

      By subscribing you not only get to vote on the direction of development, but you also ensure that they still exist tomorrow. And I got news for people, if they go out of business, all of their AFPL'd changes stay with them. The only changes they made that the public will get are all the 2d/dib/audio changes they contributed to the main wine tree before it went LGPL. (It was still X11).

  • Transgaming isn't bad. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by ciryon ( 218518 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:37PM (#3596626) Journal
    Many people are mad at Transgaming because they're choosing to release their code under a non-GPL licence. People are paying to get the binary code and gets to vote for their favourite game. This might sound bad, but the thing is that they have really created something really great. The advancements have been huge. I'm still amazed to see Diablo II or new games like Solider of Fortune II or Jedi Outcast run perfectly on my Linux box.

    Transgaming has also promised to give back the sourcecode to Wine. There are many obstacles, including licenced technology like SafeDisc and S3 Texture Compression (if they ever do it) but I'm sure they can overcome it.

    I would guess there are now more working games for Linux than for Mac OS. That's impressive.

    Ciryon

    • Re:Transgaming isn't bad. (Score:5, Informative)

      by jordan_a ( 139457 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:43PM (#3596664)
      Transgaming was promising to give back their sourcecode ton Wine. They've since changed their policy on that and any mention of merging with the wine tree after meeting their targets has been silently dropped from their website.
      • Look at the facts. WINE got mad that Transgaming wasn't contributing fast enough, so they effectively took their ball and went home by changing their license on everyone. Transgaming now contributes to the Rewind project, which can accept their work and is glad to do so. Transgaming has done an excellent job making money in a way that still contributes to the community while offering an extremely valuable service. I'll give you a hint, there's a bad guy here, and it isn't Transgaming.
        • Look at the facts. WINE got mad that Transgaming wasn't contributing fast enough, so they effectively took their ball and went home by changing their license on everyone. Transgaming now contributes to the Rewind project, which can accept their work and is glad to do so.

          WINE got mad? Who controls the source tree?
          CodeWeavers.
          Who controls WINE?
          Who got mad at TransGaming for not contributing fast enough?
          Who doesn't want to 'trade code'?

          Transgaming has offered to release some of it's heftier work in trade for more 'free' work on another area - which would be done for free anyways-, but that suggestion was refused. Apparently business need to carry more weight than people working on the side, but can't make any money on it either. Way to go guys!

        • My Linux desktop contains less than 3% GNU software.

          I am assuming you are running a Linux system (as opposed to a Windows, OS X, or *BSD System). If so, delete glibc and see how far you get.

          The fact is, something like 99.9999999% of the non-GNU software you have you your Linux Desktop does, in fact, contain GNU software (in the form of library function calls). Not that percentages matter, since a well designed OS, like the Linux and GNU stuff, should be small and tight compared to the user applications (The X Window System, KDE/Gnome, OpenOffice, etc.) that run upon it. And, as my glibc example above illustrates, percentages are hardly indicative of importance, else you shouldn't be calling it Linux at all, since that is only 10% of the 3% (i.e. 0.3%) of your desktop system.

          Reject Stallman's request to prefix the OS name with GNU if you like, but refusing to recognize his contribution, without which you wouldn't have the desktop system you have at all, is nothing more than crass ingratitude parading around as some kind of misguided political statement
        • My Linux desktop contains less than 3% GNU software.

          How much of that software would ever have been developed if the GNU tools weren't available when Linux was released? Don't call it "GNU/Linux" if you don't want to, but at least give RMS the credit he truly does deserve.


      • Transgaming offered to trade many of their changes to the code for several of the changes that had gone into the LGPL tree. This seems reasonable to me, but the people with the LGPL patches weren't interested. If WINE is not going to help Transgaming, why should Transgaming help WINE?

    • There's no reason why they can't continue proprietary development against the LGPL tree. You have to wonder if their motives are really good for the Wine community if transgaming doesn't even want to commit to sharing their updates to the existing codebase.

      If they don't plan on sharing their code, which their ***ACTIONS*** indicate, then all they are doing is discouraging development of free API implementations by fooling people into believing that it's already done.

      Parasites with good marketing. Show me the code or STFU.
      • There's no reason why they can't continue proprietary development against the LGPL tree.

        Actually, someone asked in a TransGaming forum for more frequent binaries. The official reply was that the copy-protection code is not remotely modular, so it takes a fair amount of release engineering and testing to go from CVS to a full binary release. I assume that this is why they don't find an LGPL WINE useful.

    • Re:Transgaming isn't bad. (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Cyno ( 85911 )
      Transgaming has also promised to give back the sourcecode...There are many obstacles...but I'm sure they can overcome it.

      I'll believe it when I see it. The message sent from their CEO states otherwise.

      I'm still amazed to see Diablo II or new games...run perfectly on my Linux box.

      First off they don't run perfectly. There are tons of problems. They are not 100% directx 8.x compliant. And they are not acting like an open source company: they deserve no slack from the community since they get paid for their work. Now they need to support those products, period.
      Wine has been running games like starcraft for ages. It just takes a lot of effort to configure everything properly. Eventually the wine project will break through the proprietary SafeDisc stuff. You don't need a license to reverse engineer.

      I would guess there are now more working games for Linux than for Mac OS.

      I would guess that, too, since Loki released about 20 games, KDE includes a nice collection, as does GNOME. And wine supported a few. Winex gave me the ability to run Homeworld. And for that I feel my $60 contribution was worth it. But I still can't get diablo II to work and I was under the impression my money would go to fund sourcecode that eventually would fall under a GNU license. Was I wrong? Did I throw my money away? Yes. But I won't do it again.
      • "First off they don't run perfectly. There are tons of problems. They are not 100% directx 8.x compliant. And they are not acting like an open source company: they deserve no slack from the community since they get paid for their work. Now they need to support those products, period."

        There are only a few products they officially support. And Diablo II does run 'perfectly' for me, just as well as it does under Windoze.

        "Wine has been running games like starcraft for ages. It just takes a lot of effort to configure everything properly. Eventually the wine project will break through the proprietary SafeDisc stuff. You don't need a license to reverse engineer."

        But with horrible 2d performance and unreliable battle.net, which they have FIXED. And actually, the DMCA and other laws may prevent SafeDisc stuff from being implemented in the main wine tree, it's one of the reasons I think (beyond the proprietary aspect) that they can't put it in the public AFPL'd source.

        "I would guess that, too, since Loki released about 20 games, KDE includes a nice collection, as does GNOME. And wine supported a few. Winex gave me the ability to run Homeworld. And for that I feel my $60 contribution was worth it. But I still can't get diablo II to work and I was under the impression my money would go to fund sourcecode that eventually would fall under a GNU license. Was I wrong? Did I throw my money away? Yes. But I won't do it again."

        It sounds like you have a personal vendetta. There are *MANY* people who are running Diablo II perfectly. You have to remember that they can't control all the factors, a lot of video cards under Linux have some pretty crappy drivers. Also, they have stated that their code would go into the wine tree when they got enough subscribers. I don't forsee that changing, especially since they haven't stated so.

        • Re:Transgaming isn't bad. (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Cyno ( 85911 )
          Yeah, I understand that linux is a patchwork quilt, but commercial entities that want to create products using this quilt are still held to the same level of expectations of any other commercial entity. If I purchase a product that says it will do x then it better do x or I should get my money back. Open Source and GNU software is different. Its not commercial in nature. Its open and free. Which means everyone is held under the same expectations which are to help out or RTFM. There's only one way to do something and that is to just do it. Transgaming is trying to be both an open source and a commercial company. They'll release some of the code, but under different licenses that may be modified in the future to prevent binary distribution, etc. They require you to pay for a product that isn't complete and doesn't have a completion date. Support for games is done through a forum instead of via email or a phone call with a technical representative like any commercial software company would have. I could go on. Do you see my concerns? It wouldn't matter if I could trust Transgaming, but with their recent actions they've lost my trust. Like I said I got Homeworld working, almost perfectly. Homeworld doesn't even have screenshots in their forum, yet. I know *MANY* people got Diablo II working. But I installed the latest winex on a Matrox G450, X420, RedHat 7.2, and it never got past the install, just hangs and crashes on startup. I'm a little upset, but does that honestly sound like a vendetta against Transgaming? Must I debug wine to get winex to work? I paid good money for this software. Where's the support? I wouldn't be saying any of that if Transgaming left Debian (the most GNU distro in my opinion) alone and didn't threaten license changes to prevent software distribution. That goes directly against the GNU philosophy, and last I checked wine is licensed under a GNU license.
      • "It just takes a lot of effort to configure everything properly. Eventually the wine project will break through the proprietary SafeDisc stuff."

        Time is money. If the freedoms are gain from free software are outpaced by the burden of the time and effort spent using it, it's a victory only to the hardcore, Richard Stallman-esque idealists.

        I appreciate what the FSF types have achieved, but I don't consider 100% market saturation by free software to be an essential liberty. Therefore, I'm willing to side with convenience and pragmatism on this issue. I just don't see the value in devoting 2 hours to config file twiddling so I can run Starcraft next year.

        • Time is money
          I've always considered that an insult to time. There's no concievable limit to the amount of money I can earn. Someone can take all my money, and I can earn more somehow. My time is irretrievable. I will die, and there's no way I will get more time after I'm dead. Money might be able to buy me a little more time in very specific circumstances, but time will get me more money without much ado.

          Anyone who tells me that a situation will "eventually" get remedied "on its own, over time" has stopped talking to me and started talking to some imaginary, immortal being.

  • Nothing "Wrong" what Transgaming are doing here... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Jack Hughes ( 5351 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @02:48PM (#3596694)
    ... They've taken a BSD licensed piece of software, written by others, and made it there own. Well, the BSD licence says that's OK. ... But if the copyright holders are pissed off by this, they can reliscense the original. Well they were, and now Wine is under the GPL. So that's OK. ... So Transgaming should probably just simplify things and plainly state that WineX is a proprietry system... so that outside people don't get confused and submit patches to them under the illusion that it is free software or open source.

    Does a proprietry WineX threaten Linux in any way? No not really. It is a system that allows proprietry windows software to run on open source/free Linux. It hardly matters quite where the free/prop. divide is drawn either above or below the middleware - the end result is that the user is running is a non-free application - although things might be a bit confused if they start sticking prop. kernel modules into Linux - but then again, there is the precedence of VMware et al for this.

    So there is nothing legally wrong with what Transgaming are doing. I say let them carry on - but just clear up the confusion and plainly state that WineX is a proprietry system. If anyone's nose is out of joint then it was Wine's fault for ever being under the BSD liscense - which it isn't now.

    Of course Transgamings Business Model is wrong. They should simply re-sell Windows games - either to Windows users or to Linux users bundling WineX and some installation glue a la codeweavers.

    • Of course Transgamings Business Model is wrong. They should simply re-sell Windows games - either to Windows users or to Linux users bundling WineX and some installation glue a la codeweavers.

      Eh? I've got some stuff to sell those people also ;-).
  • Right now, I am a paid subscriber to Transgaming. If they don't get their act together - and I mean soon - they are going to have one less subscriber. I will not support a company that doesn't contribute to free software.
    • Right now, I am a paid subscriber to Transgaming. If they don't get their act together - and I mean soon - they are going to have one less subscriber. I will not support a company that doesn't contribute to free software.

      Huh? They DO contribute to free software (ReWind for sure, which Wine can then mooch off of Transgaming - see how that works both ways?), but they PAY PROGRAMMERS TO DO IT FULL TIME. Where do you think the money comes from? When's the last time you DONATED to a free project?

      • Re:About time to dump Transgaming (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Cylix ( 55374 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:28PM (#3597007) Homepage Journal
        Well...

        It is fine to pay programmers to do work and then sell that work for a moderate fee. However, their BASE was taken from a free project.

        Of course under the old Wine license this was fine and legal. Now they have changed...

        What erks me royally is the idea that Debian wants to do something that could fall quite in line with the available license and the WineX guys are throwing a fit.

        I have no objections to turning a profit, but these guys seem to forget their roots.
        • It is fine to pay programmers to do work and then sell that work for a moderate fee. However, their BASE was taken from a free project.

          More on that in a bit :)

          What erks me royally is the idea that Debian wants to do something that could fall quite in line with the available license and the WineX guys are throwing a fit.

          Unfortunately, someone screwed up, and Transgaming has to save their ass. Either they should have picked a license that covers this issue, or they should have realized that Wine/Codeweavers would change to the GPL.

          I have no objections to turning a profit, but these guys seem to forget their roots.

          Personally, I find these kinds of statements amusing. The current Wine guys aren't the ones who originated the project. I believe Alexandre Julliard has been there the longest, but I don't think he started it.

          So to 'remember your roots', they should be working on Wine in the faith of the original author, no?

          Maybe people shouldn't code for idealism, but just towards a working product? Just a thought...

          • I should clarify the roots portion...

            The root of the WineX project is the Wine project. WineX is a branch in all simplicity. They took a free project and added their touches under their license.

            Someone wants to use their product in a manner fitting with their license. (Although this was under debate in a few emails)

            WineX cries foul and threatens to change if such things happen.

            I would not be so apt to complain if WineX was a completely original piece of software. That is where the whole ordeal starts to annoy me.

            I want things to work out and I'm sure their efforts are beneficial. I just don't like their way of doing things. Of course, they have all the right in the world to do it their way and I'm happy disliking it ;)
      • When's the last time you DONATED to a free project?

        For the record, I've donated $30 to the Freenet project [freenetproject.org] in the past year. I donate whenever I think a project is worthwhile, and Transgaming has just about passed that time.
    • Hi there, BTW. They do contribute to free software. Or haven't you noticed the code merges that went into the MAIN wine tree in the past from them? Yeesh. Research a little, k?

  • Fool me once.... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by KernelHappy ( 517524 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:00PM (#3596777) Homepage
    This just illustrates why its important to understand the license governing a project before contributing to it. It is also the reason why the OSI keeps a list [opensource.org] of approved licenses.

    If you didn't take time to understand the license before contributing to the project, you can't complain that you don't like the result.

  • Free Speach or Free Beer (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dirkx ( 540136 ) <dirkx@vangulik.org> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:04PM (#3596805) Homepage
    What is free ? Or rather who has that freedome ?

    The ability to do -anything- with the code; whenever you want it; however you want it. Or in other words you and your actions are the thing that is free.

    Or the ability of the code to distribute itself to wherever the code wants to go; and protection for the code to insure it does not get hidden away in obscure places.

    BSD chooses the first as being important - at the expense of freedom of the code.

    The GPL chooses the latter - at the expense of freedom for you.

    And as with all things in live - reality is a compromize; one cannot have both. Companies and people who want their code to be used in the widest possible way generally pick the BSD code - and people who want their creations to have a robust live of their own - for eternity to come - and out of reach of commercialization - pick the GPL.

    Dw.

  • http://www.winehq.com/hypermail/wine-license/

  • reasonable request (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ender Ryan ( 79406 ) <TOKYO minus city> on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:07PM (#3596824) Journal
    I think it's a perfectly reasonable request of transgaming to ask the debian maintainers to not package a binary build of winex from their cvs repository, that could really cut into their bottom line, which, despite what so many here say, is important for a company.

    People like to bitch about transgaming, but they really have done nothing wrong. They grabbed wine, used it according to the license attached to it, offered to trade code to/from the main wine tree. There's nothing wrong with that, if the wine developers didn't want their code used in that manner they should have (L)GPLed it from the start.

    Similarly, if the debian crew decides to ignore transgaming's request and package winex in the distribution anyway, transgaming has nothing to complain about, but they can decide to change their license if they think they need too.

    I think everyone needs a nice fine glass of STFU.

    • Re:reasonable request (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Daengbo ( 523424 )
      You know what? I, personally, think that Debian should go ahead and package their CVS. Not because I plan to use it, though. It will force the issue, and if Transgaming closes the CVS, then everyone will understand their motives and act as their concience dictates, while, if they don't, people will likely give them less grief (and I doubt they'll lose any real subscribers over it, either) Right now everyone is in this churning, burning, middle ground. Bad place to be...bad.
  • If you don't like it, then rescind your subscription. This will remind them why people don't develop commercial games for Linux, which made room for their project in the first place.

    Of course they'll eventually find something else to do and/or starve to death.
  • There is a lot of confusion about this licensing debiacle. The main problem is, there are components added to winex binaries that can't be released in open source format (safedisk copy protection support, Install Shield). Other stuff will be released when their subscriber base can sustain further development (~20k subscribers). Some stuff is released back into the mainstream wine almost immediately (some of the DCOM support).

    Granted, their method of releasing code isn't perfect, they also don't have the comercial customer support base that codeweavers has. And yes, they do support .deb, .rpm, & .tgz binary releases now (as of 2.01).

    • Sadly, I wonder if they'll ever hit 20,000 at last check they only hit about 3,000. Personally, I wonder how much longer they can stay around. The saddest thing about this is stupid flamewars like this only end up hurting users.

  • Clearing things up (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rmassa ( 529444 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:26PM (#3596981)
    I think that most people here are misunderstanding the issue, and as a long WineX subscriber, I feel that I need to clarify.

    WineX has _always_ been available in source form for free (meaning you can get it even if you aren't a subscriber) if you are willing and able to pull it from their CVS servers. What has never been free is their compiled code, in which they add such goodies such as safedisc and securerom support (which of course, can't be open sourced, because WineX licensed it from the companies that created the copy protection)
    What Transgaming is asking is that distributions don't package the free version of their source as a package, so people don't get the impression that when they try to run new game x with copy protection that it doesn't work with the WineX period, and not actually go and check transgamings site and realize that they need to buy the commercial version. I would hope more from the average linux user, but I can see their point.
    Besides, people have been tolerating this behaviour from the MPlayer project for a long time, so I don't see what the big deal is. If you don't agree with their reasons, then exercise your right to choose and don't use the product :).
  • All is needed is a package of the recent source. The end user can build it! Also I wouldn't loose
    sleep over this. WineX will certainly die and
    Open Source will have control again. The only games that play flawlessly are the Quakes and modified Quakes (Star Wars, Arena). I tried
    Homeworld, it dies, I tried Half Life, it died.
    So why do we want to support WineX. I don't, and we can control the direction Wine will take. I bought crossover wine.. and they are contributing back to the wine project, so let's back codeweavers and the wine progect. Transgaming is out.

    Also let's promote native games!
  • Can't we just just apt-get along? nyuk nyuk

  • This is not a "bad" thing... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Eric Damron ( 553630 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2002 @03:37PM (#3597111)
    If we want Linux to become "main stream" we need to allow companies who support us to earn a living doing so. If TransGaming wants to keep their source closed, they have the right to do so under the X11 license. Now that WINE is under the LGPL license, they cannot incorporate any contributions to the LGPL'd tree without following the LGPL license agreement, which, I believe, would force them to put their source tree under the LGPL also.

    So, if they want to go it alone without the support of the open source community then God bless them but as Wine moves forward or in a different direction they will need to keep their source tree free of LGPL'd code.

    The two branches will get farther and farther apart and eventually, I believe that the Open Source branch will be superior and TransGaming will be in danger of going the way of the dinosaur.

  • IMHO (Score:2, Interesting)

    by RenHoek ( 101570 )
    You know, I was really hoping this was going to take off. The only reason why I still have Windows on my computer is for games. Everything else I can do under Linux or Wine.

    It's true that Transgaming was making a huge contribution to Linux, in an area where Linux was very poor. They were not that expensive with what they asked for their efforts. (Subscription based; $5 per month, $50 for a year)

    However, they stated on their website that after 20.000 people became a member they will GPL all their code. Now Wine is LGPL they complain that it is too restrictive, while LGPL is less restrictive then GPL.

    Another thing, the place where they mentioned the 20.000 people limit (Business Model [transgaming.com]), has suddenly been changed in the past 2 days. I know because I was looking into subscribing to them. I was even planning on mailing them to ask them how many people they already had. So is it a lie? Were they ever going to GPL their code? We had only that statement that disappeared without a trace.

    So presumably no. Why? Because in their CEO's rant [transgaming.com] about Wine's license change to GPL, he states that it is impossible due to DMCA issues with the copyright protection they implemented. Also, they would for some reason be 'locked' into supporting Wine even if their business model would not pay what they want it to pay.

    I can agree a little with the copy protection bit. However their claim that it contains highly sensitive information is nonsense. Advanced copy protections like SafeDisc and Securom have been reversed completely. Look up any reverser's webboard and you'll be smacked around the ears with all the little tricks that they use. With that you could even easily emulate the protection (which is already done in programs like Daemon-Tools [daemon-tools.com]).

    So that can't be it. Did I mention that programs like InstallShield and Wise have been completely reversed too? Again, with this info around that can be found on any reversers board, anyone could write his own InstallShield installer.
    The DMCA threat is overrated, although the DMCA has been abused for more ridiculous things already.

    Then secondly, being locked in for support. I write some crappy [cs.hro.nl] OpenSource tools. I do this under an Artistic License. But with this, or even the GPL, there is NO obligation mentioned anywhere that I have to give support on it. Better still, it is explicitly stated that NO LEGAL RESPONSIBILITY is given with this software.

    So what do they complain about? Maybe they claim that they have to keep up to date with the Wine tree? Also not true. They can take any copy of Wine, and work on it, as long as they publish their changes. No other obligation then that.

    So where does this leave us? Remember SSH? The original author (Klonen if I recall correctly) had SSH as a GPL package, but later on changed it to a pay-for-commercial license. A group of people took the last GPL'd version and coded on it until they got OpenSSH, which is a perfectly fine SSH client and 100% GPL. This is a GOOD thing.

    Now Transgaming is pushing Rewind, which is pretty much the same coupe as OpenSSH, except they do it so that the X11 license can be kept. Now you can argue that Transgaming deserves money for the work they do. Well I agree with that, but how far should we support that? Is Transgaming just putting up a friendly OpenSource front so they can get people to work for them for free? Or is it to get people to like them?

    In short, by pushing the Rewind branch, they take away time and resources from the main Wine tree. This hurts us normal users. They put up a false front to attract coders and clients. If they were honest about their work, and it would help the Linux community then I'd gladly pay them for their efforts, but now I'm pretty much disillusioned.
    • AFAIK, they were _never_ going to GPL the code. They said they would release it under the Wine license, and Wine's license at the time was the X11 license.

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