On Cygwin package naming and a setup.exe bug

Christopher Faylor cgf@redhat.com
Mon Aug 27 11:37:00 GMT 2001


On Mon, Aug 27, 2001 at 08:01:59PM +0200, Bernard Dautrevaux wrote:
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Christopher Faylor [ mailto:cgf@redhat.com ]
>> Sent: Monday, August 27, 2001 7:39 PM
>> To: cygwin@cygwin.com
>> Subject: Re: On Cygwin package naming and a setup.exe bug

>> Who made the offer to continue to include the sources to whatever is
>> being distributed?  Not me.  I don't want to have to track the PRC
>> project and make sure that I don't delete, say, the Cygwin 1.3.2
>> sources because they are still using them.
>
>I think there'(s a bit of misunderstanding here: What john says was that it
>was distributing:
>	several binary distributions of PRC-tools (as cygwin tarballs
>       and RPMs) source distribution of PRC-tools (as a source tarball)
>
>He thus complies with the GPL.

Unless you have downloaded everything and inspected it, you can't make a
statement like that.

>Note that he explicitely says he was NOT distributing Cygwin, just provide a
>proper setup.ini so that the setup.exe used to install Cygwin from the
>official cygwin web site (or any other source AFAAIC). 

John did not use the word DLL anywhere.  So, I assume that it is possible
that he is including the DLL.  He mentions a "Cygwin binary package".  I
don't know what is in this package.  I just offered an advisory note.

I'm not actively downloading the packages and inspecting them for GPL
violations so that I can call FSF/Red Hat lawyers.  I'm just offering
my usual caveat about this because people get it wrong all of the time.
They make the same assumptions that are being made in this thread and
get hot and bothered about things that are really cut and dry.

>I don't see where there would be ANY GPL concern with this (although, as
>usual, IANAL).

And as far as I can tell, you don't even have in-depth knowledge about
what is being offered.

>> >You shouldn't give John a hard time; the PRC-Tools project is a free
>> >software project in much the same spirit as Cygwin.  In fact, the two
>> >projects are very similar: a GCC port to a non-Unix 
>> platform, for making
>> >binaries native to that platform.
>> 
>> "Why are you giving me a hard time! I'm a free software 
>> project!".  Yes,
>> we hear this from time to time.  The GPL is a legal binding document.
>> If you want to use it, you should be in compliance with it.  You don't
>> get to ignore it because you consider yourself "one of the good guys".
>> It would be nice if life worked that way, but it doesn't.
>
>IMHO John is perfectly complying with the GPL. What I would say is, rather
>than "don't be ruide with me, I'm a free project programmer" would be "Don't
>start thinking I will not comply with the GPL for your product; I'm already
>complying for mine, so check before ranting :-)"

I was not ranting.  I stated a fact.  I did not do it rudely.  If you or
anyone took a statement of fact as rudeness then you have reading skills
problems.   There may be a mailing list that will deal with this but
this is not it.

(In case you are wondering *that* was a rude comment.  You might want to
compare and contrast to see if you can see the difference)

>> >> Not surprising since this isn't a goal for setup.exe.  
>> It's really only
>> >> intended to install cygwin packages.
>> >
>> >What makes PRC-Tools "not a Cygwin package" and, say, tcltk "a Cygwin
>> >package"?  Both are programming language systems that live within the
>> >Cygwin environment.
>> 
>> The PRC-Tools are not distributed from the cygwin web site.  They are
>> not an official cygwin package.  Do I really have to explain this?
>
>So, setup.exe is *restricted* to install *official* cygwin packages? a bit
>too harsh I think.

Wow.  Density prevails. (more rudeness)

HANDLING OTHER DISTRIBUTIONS IS NOT A GOAL OF THE CYGWIN SETUP UTILITY.

Did you happen to read the part where I said "I"d have to get a ruling
from the other developers..."?

I also suggested a couple of ways to work around this without modifying
setup.exe.  I assume that you missed those, too.

>>It apparently isn't clear to you that "Cygwin's own installation tools"
>>were meant to install, um, the cygwin packages from the cygwin web site
>>and mirrors.  They don't have accomodations for using other web sites
>>or being bundled as part of a larger package.  That is what I was
>>saying above.
>
>Was that a "for now and ever" position, and are then patches to allow
>to install "unofficial" cygwin packages with setup.exe forcibly
>refused?

You've really lost a lot of state from my original message and are
assigning positions to me that I never took.  I said I had "mixed
feelings", which is certainly my right.  I said that it would require "a
ruling" from other developers.  This would indicate that I was willing
to support other distributions.

Any change to setup.exe entails some support overhead.  Adding the
proposed patch may also not be the right way to handle this.  The other
developers may not want to worry about non-core-cygwin releases.  I
can't believe that I have to keep explaining this.

>I personally would have think of setup.exe as *the* tool to manage a cygwin
>installation, like rpm is *the* tool to manage a Red Hat linux install or
>addpkg is *the* tool to manage a Solaris (or is it an HPux) system. That,
>for me, has meant that i should try to provide my own packages in a form
>suitable for installation/uninstallation by setup.exe.

You can think whatever you want.  Since I was the person who got the
setup.exe program started and have remained an active contributor to it
I think I know what was intended.

I am 100% certain that we are not thinking about third-party installation
problems in any of our discussions about setup.exe.  What that means is
that it will probably take some discussion before anything like John's
patch is accepted.

>If I'm wrong, I will then try to use RPM or some other fancy installer and
>have to tinker it to be able to pick cygwin configuration data so that I
>install my package in a sensible way, with sensible defaults, in an exsiting
>cygwin install... Phew, do I really need to do that? ;-(

This is an open source project.  You can take setup.exe sources and do
whatever you like with them as long as you adhere to the GPL.

If you want to start a discussion going on how setup.exe can support
third-party apps, feel free.  No one is going to stop you.  The flip
side is that if people are uninterested in this aspect of setup.exe, no
one is going to help you much either.

Let me just summarize (again can't believe that I have to):

1) I'm not mad at John for daring to suggest a change to setup.exe.

2) I don't know if there are GPL issues in the PRC-Tools release.  I was
   just raising the possibility because people are so often confused about
   the subject.

3) I accepted the bug fix that John suggested.

4) Third-party package setup.exe handling has not been a goal for setup.exe.
   A patch which adds something for dealing with third-party use does not
   get blindly accepted.  It gets discussed.

cgf

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