[antlr-interest] ANTLR 3 License

[Matt Benson]

I have personally made no arguments either for or
against LGPL and I use and contribute to software
under this license, complying with its terms to my
best ability based on my understanding of them.  I
will also make no attempt to contradict your assertion
that I am (like others, I'm sure) too lazy to wade
through the "reams of electrons" that constitute these
open-source licenses, preferring to adhere to the
distilled "bottom line" accepted by the community at
large and shared by those with more patience.  I use
open-source software as much as possible (for damned
near everything I suppose); however I limit the ways
in which I use an open-source package to the aspects
of its license I think I understand.  Rest assured
that when an issue arises for which I need a thorough
understanding of "X" license, I will invest the
appropriate neurons.  In the meantime, I feel like my
approach is not as reckless as it could be and I will
not lose sleep over your (fairly on-target)
accusations because my comfort is worth more to me
than your approval, ya know?

-Matt

--- Braden McDaniel <braden at endoframe.com> wrote:
> Quoting Matt Benson <gudnabrsam at yahoo.com>:
> 
> > Wow.  That was rough.  Personally, I'm not the
> least
> > bit ashamed to admit having difficulty in
> > understanding the dizzying wording of the various
> > open-source licenses.
> 
> That reflects the unfortunate fact that, "I'm a
> techie; I shouldn't be 
> expected to understand a legal document," has become
> an accepted means of 
> evading the chore of dealing with and understanding
> the issues of policy that 
> are an inevitable consequence of writing code. In
> general, such documents are 
> written to be understandable and unambiguous--with
> the unfortunate side effect 
> of making them verbose and tedious to read.
> 
> As a matter of fact, there are plenty of software
> engineers working at 
> software companies who routinely and confidently use
> and depend on LGPL 
> software. Assertions to the contrary exhibit
> ignorance.
> 
> I am not trying to promote the LGPL for use with a
> future version of ANTLR. In 
> fact, as long as my ability to continue to use ANTLR
> output with my LGPL 
> software is not threatened--and I do not anticipate
> that it will be--I have no 
> opinion on the matter. However, just about every
> message posted decrying the 
> potential application of the LGPL to ANTLR has
> included varying amounts of 
> inaccuracy, much of which has obviously been FUD
> repeated n-hand. As someone 
> who develops LGPL software, I may be inclined to
> respond harshly to gross 
> inaccuracies resulting from what I perceive as
> in-your-face intellectual 
> laziness.
> 
> -- 
> Braden McDaniel                           e-mail:
> <braden at endoframe.com>
> <http://endoframe.com>                    Jabber:
<braden at jabber.org>


__________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
SBC Yahoo! DSL - Now only $29.95 per month!
http://sbc.yahoo.com

 

Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/