Free Sudoku - Now All Zaurus And Archos Supported

[maystorm]

@arniel:

You shouldn't stop or delay releasing the source code just because documentation is not ready! It is, of course, much easier to work on documented source code if you want to make changes to the functionality of the program, however, for the purpose of porting to other platforms you can get around w/o it.

[ken]

Thanks.

It's in OE and builds fine. I guess a lot of OpenZaurus users will be happy soon.
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Win the battle, but lose the war.   In one's zeal to have the source code, yet another developer gets pissed off and discouraged.

It's nice to want things.   It's nice to have things.   It's discouraging to those that can't develope to see this kind of war where in their zeal, as much gets destroyed as is gained.   The zaurus platform has a hard enough time trying to get people to create anything, that we don't always have to be our brother's keeper.  What would have been the big deal to not have the game on OE for now?  You can't get people to be willing to develop and freely give of their time and effort if we always try to be a stickler.  Come on.  It's hard getting anything on the Z.

Ultimately, what would have been the big deal to wait or be less demanding?  Even if he never released the source code, we had at least gained someone's willingness to create.  Who knows what other software figlabs would have been willing to create, if the atmosphere were just a little different.

I suspect his attitude now will be more like "wow, this is cool.  I think I'll create this ... oh, but if I do that ...."

I hope the price was worth it.

Sometimes it's better not to have, and to lose a little here and there so we can gain more in the long run.

I watch as the Z dies a little more each day and it saddens me.

[koen]

Thanks.

It's in OE and builds fine. I guess a lot of OpenZaurus users will be happy soon.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136719\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

Win the battle, but lose the war.   In one's zeal to have the source code, yet another developer gets pissed off and discouraged.

It's nice to want things.   It's nice to have things.   It's discouraging to those that can't develope to see this kind of war where in their zeal, as much gets destroyed as is gained.   The zaurus platform has a hard enough time trying to get people to create anything, that we don't always have to be our brother's keeper.  What would have been the big deal to not have the game on OE for now?  You can't get people to be willing to develop and freely give of their time and effort if we always try to be a stickler.  Come on.  It's hard getting anything on the Z.

Ultimately, what would have been the big deal to wait or be less demanding?  Even if he never released the source code, we had at least gained someone's willingness to create.  Who knows what other software figlabs would have been willing to create, if the atmosphere were just a little different.

I suspect his attitude now will be more like "wow, this is cool.  I think I'll create this ... oh, but if I do that ...."

I hope the price was worth it.

Sometimes it's better not to have, and to lose a little here and there so we can gain more in the long run.

I watch as the Z dies a little more each day and it saddens me.
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No one is forcing you to use the GPL to develop apps, so quit whining about big bad developers and poor little figlabs. Figlabs choose the gpl, and people have been asking nicely since *february* for them to release the source.
If figlabs can't manage a (umodified!) source release in 6 months I wonder how they can create all the apps you are talking about.

[adf]

Thanks.

It's in OE and builds fine. I guess a lot of OpenZaurus users will be happy soon.
[div align=\"right\"][a href=\"index.php?act=findpost&pid=136719\"][{POST_SNAPBACK}][/a][/div]

Win the battle, but lose the war.   In one's zeal to have the source code, yet another developer gets pissed off and discouraged.

It's nice to want things.   It's nice to have things.   It's discouraging to those that can't develope to see this kind of war where in their zeal, as much gets destroyed as is gained.   The zaurus platform has a hard enough time trying to get people to create anything, that we don't always have to be our brother's keeper.  What would have been the big deal to not have the game on OE for now?  You can't get people to be willing to develop and freely give of their time and effort if we always try to be a stickler.  Come on.  It's hard getting anything on the Z.

Ultimately, what would have been the big deal to wait or be less demanding?  Even if he never released the source code, we had at least gained someone's willingness to create.  Who knows what other software figlabs would have been willing to create, if the atmosphere were just a little different.

I suspect his attitude now will be more like "wow, this is cool.  I think I'll create this ... oh, but if I do that ...."

I hope the price was worth it.

Sometimes it's better not to have, and to lose a little here and there so we can gain more in the long run.

I watch as the Z dies a little more each day and it saddens me.
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good metaphor, and vey apt- but mis applied. The "war" is for the exisetence and continuity of open source software, not softare availability for an obscure (but much loved ) japanese pda.

I'm very glad rob got this program working, and certainly didn't want to " piss him off," but what if MS or ATT start making linux software claiming it is gpl the start playing games with code ownership, or more likely stretching the GPL to meaninglessness/ I assure you, if the opportunity is made it will be taken.  Then where will we be? dramatic, I guess, but the guys at the old netscape probopably would't laugh.

[hvontres]

Well, OK, the whole purpose of me working on the package was to make life easier for those who wanted to use the source - by adding comments, documentation etc. It seems there is little incentive for us to do that so, instead, here is the original source used to build the app.
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Thank you very much for yor program... I just built it for my Poodle running OZ 3.5.4.1 and it worked right out of the box.

And, with the souce available out here, maybe some of the other devs can dig in and help you get things cleaned up..  

Thank you again and please, keep up the good work

And thank you Mickeyl for getting this into the dev branch so quickly

[Mjolinor]

I look at this and find myself sitting well and truly on the fence

I can see the "thin end of the wedge" view and it is absolutely valid but on the other hand this wedge seems to get thinner and thinner so strictly speaking every time I write a bit of C code to crunch some numbers or swap some entries in a file I should clog the Internet up with it, I would find it really embarrasing to post 1st drafts of anything I write and this would stop me releasing anything I wrote until I had chance to comment it and order it all, so in this case should the binary not have been given away until the source code was ready for release? That sucks.

At what point is the GPL broken? If I had written it and given the binary to a mate and he had then passed it to a few mates and then it had been put on a web site where was the GPL broken if I don't give my mate the source, he would have been unlikely to want it anyway.

I tried reading and understanding the GPL license a few years ago but it has the same effect on me as reading or talking about patents (yawn).

[koen]

so in this case should the binary not have been given away until the source code was ready for
release? That sucks.

No, you only have to provide the source on request and you can even charge for the costs you make, e.g. burning a cd and mailing it. But you chose the GPL yourself, so don't start crying if someone holds you to it.

At what point is the GPL broken? If I had written it and given the binary to a mate and he had then passed it to a few mates and then it had been put on a web site where was the GPL broken if I don't give my mate the source, he would have been unlikely to want it anyway.
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Simply put: everyone that passes on the binary must be able to supply the source on request.

The GPL is essentially a big backup device in case your harddrive crashes during the time you are 'cleaning'.

Try reading [a href=\"http://www.openembedded.org/gpl-causing-problems-for-derivative-linux-distros]http://www.openembedded.org/gpl-causing-pr...e-linux-distros[/url] and the articles linked to.

[Mjolinor]

So in truth if someone doesn't want to release the source all they need to do is say that it was written in machine code and there is nothing that anyone can do about it because the binary is all there is, no one can prove otherwise and the source is distributed when the binary is given out.

[maystorm]

Ultimately, what would have been the big deal to wait or be less demanding?

What would have been the big deal to immediately release the source?

Figlabs chose to release the binary so it must have reached a mature enough state that they decided to give it to the public. Why not giving out the source code at the same time? It seems unlogical that one believes the binary is ready for the public but not the sources. And if time constraints prevent creation of proper documentation then this is exactly a very good reason to release them because of these constraints. There may be other people out there who could be more than happy to contribute to the program by writing the documentation. Because this is what Open Source is all about! The community allows that each other helps each other. This doesn't stop at the coding level but also extent to other areas such as documentation and testing and promoting and what have you.

So, Figlabs should not feel displeased. Not at all! Zudoku is now running fine under OZ, and this within hours after releasing the sources! And even w/o properly documented sources. In the Open Source community there is always somebody else who has time if you don't have it. You cannot do everything yourself. Let others help out if time is short.

Finally, look at the creator of Linux himself. If he had decided not to make his first version of Linux available to the public because that very first version contained ugly hacks and was not documented at all at that time, would we all be here now???

[maystorm]

So in truth if someone doesn't want to release the source all they need to do is say that it was written in machine code and there is nothing that anyone can do about it because the binary is all there is, no one can prove otherwise and the source is distributed when the binary is given out.

No, this is wrong. A compiler always leaves his own particular tracks in the binary. So, by looking at the binary you can always find out that it was compiled.

[Mjolinor]

So in truth if someone doesn't want to release the source all they need to do is say that it was written in machine code and there is nothing that anyone can do about it because the binary is all there is, no one can prove otherwise and the source is distributed when the binary is given out.

No, this is wrong. A compiler always leaves his own particular tracks in the binary. So, by looking at the binary you can always find out that it was compiled.
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This is just not true. All those bits can be removed if required. It isn't an easy job but it can be done if you are determined not to release source code and don't want to break the GPL.

[maystorm]

No, you can't remove the way certain things are compiled by the compiler. You can perhaps remove symbols, copyright messages and such, but this is not what I meant.

Each compiler has something like a footprint, the way how it compiles certain constructs of higher languages. Each compiler compiles code according to specific algorithms. Of course, you need to know the inner workings of that compiler, but you can recognize these specifics in the binaries. May not be trivial, but possible.

Using a disassembler is a first step. Looking at the assembler code generated it will be possible to recognize specific characterics typical for the compiler being used.

[Mjolinor]

If they can be seen they can be removed, it's just binary.

It isn't easy or quick but they can be removed.

[maystorm]

If you remove executable pieces from the binary the binary will not run anymore.  

[koen]

If you remove executable pieces from the binary the binary will not run anymore. 
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Yes, you will end up with a 0 bytes large binary that doesn't violate the GPL! Take that you "we want the source" whiners!