MakerOfThings7:
Why is SOAPICS GPL? That really limits it's usage. Can you change it to LGPL?
http://soapics.codeplex.com/license
My application is proprietary, and the GPL license requires that I distribute source of my app if I simply link to this library. That's a no-go for me.
code poet:
There are many reasons that this, and other libraries, are GPL as opposed to LGPL.
You can find a really succinct summary at here.
The altruistic line is that the more free (as in speech as well as beer) software we publish under FLOSS licenses now, the more there will be in the future.
The pragmatic line, which is the one I tend to defer to, is that I am willing to pay forward the hundreds of hours and countless headaches (and those to come) that went into developing Soapi.CS. Anyone who is writing FLOSS, thus paying back and forward, is welcome to use the code without cost or restriction.
Proprietary, or closed source, software, is not 'free as in speech' and typically not 'free as in beer', and implies that the free (as in speech, definitely not as in beer) work that has been put into the library is being taken out of with nothing put back in.
But back to the pragmatic part:
It is my feeling that if someone wishes to use my work in proprietary or commercial software that, depending on the particular scenario, some type and degree of recompense is in order and that is where an LGPL exception comes into play.
Whether that be a simple thank you, a prominent attribution, a one time fee or a maintenance agreement etc all depends on the particular situation.
I encourage you (and anyone else) to email me directly at sky.sanders at gmail.com with salient details regarding your project and I am confident that satisfactory arrangements can be made.
Note: this is an issue of substance and should be discussed to the satisfaction of all and the form factor here, e.g. main post and cramped comments, does not lend itself well to that, so I will just carry on the conversation with you here in the main body, if you don't mind.
MakerOfThings7:
Me using this code will benefit [email protected] perhaps more than it will benefit myself. I'd like to permit users to log into my site and grant them additional permissions if they have a high SO rating. This will in turn get you more users through an "Affiliate" and sell more advertising. I'll have the benefit of weeding out spammers and non-technical people.
If you believe it's worthwhile to get payment for the library in this use case, perhaps you should sell it to team@stack
code poet:
I hope the adversarial tone I feel coming on is due to the limitations of the format. What I infer from your last sentence is that you feel that I am asking too much from you in providing free code for free usage but requiring an explicit agreement for taking it out of FLOSS.
Do please correct me if I am reading you wrong, and in any case let me iterate some things and re-iterate others. ;-)
- stack overflow does not need a client library for their own codebase
- code poet != stack overflow (and apparently never will be)
- what is worthwile for for Soapi/code poet != what is worthwhile for stack overflow.
- i (hopefully) made it clear that for non FLOSS, some sort of agreement would need to be arrived at and provided some possibilities, including some that involve no cost what-so-ever.
- yes, i feel that my work is of a caliber that deserves compensation in situations that indicate compensation is due. this might just be my ego on overtime, who knows?
With that said, again, I encourage you to email me with salient details regarding your proposed usage of Soapi in a proprietary setting and it is highly likely that satisfactory arrangements can be made but a blanket license shift to LGPL is not in the cards for Soapi.CS.
MakerOfThings7:
Zero adversarial tone there... I totally appreciate your work and was trying to help you cross promote since SO should pay for your library if it drives traffic to their site. Maybe you can get compensation from both sides (SO and the consumer).
When I get closer to actually needing the library, and can find a user based on email hash (has that been implemented?) then I will send you more info at your email addy.
code poet
Great. Now don't I feel like a dick. ;-) Maybe it will make interesting reading for others.
Regarding the 'users by hash' question, I know the issue has been raised in several posts, here, and in great detail in a meta post that I cannot find, but in short, the only way to do this is to maintain a complete list of users which you index yourself. This is a task that, if handled properly, is not unreasonable from both the perspective of maintenance and that of API usage. The utility of such a dataset goes far beyond simply finding users by email. I will post a CW dev-tip regarding this.
