Hetz Ben-Hamo wrote:
Now - what if my product is totally a closed source one and my client doesn't want to reveal a single source code line? then I have 2 choices regarding this DLL:
Then it's a bad decision to use xGPL licensed source base. You should be able to explain to your customer that he can try develop this whole thing on his own, which would cost him Millions, or the alternative is that to use a xGPL based code, which will save him Millions and he just has to pay for the little part he really needs added. The advantage of that saving is bigger than keeping that bit of code to your self I'd say and this is only fair to the developers who gave their time (which also costs money) and give something back. Anything else is stealing.
Sombody who want's to take the advantages of open sourced code should consider that everybody benfefits. If nobody would have decided to do that open source thing then he could pay and pay and pay for everything.
1+2+3+4=10
Then my code will look like:
5+5=10
So the code is different, but it does same thing, and I still keep my code closed...
Who's loosing here? CodeWeavers. I used their code and no one got nothing out of this. Nada. Zilch. Zero. All their investment on that DLL implementation went down, they'll have hard time to re-cap this investment.
That's stealing. Just because it is easier then stealing an expensive car doesn't mean that it is less illegal. And if somebody makes that public your company is quite in trouble. The open source mind is also based on trust and on the believe that everybody will gain in the end. After all you also incorporate and use the things others may have payed for on the same principle and could have kept for themself. If everybody is stealing only then this is the death of OS.
Lets say that CodeWeavers could drag me to court and I'll be happy to show the code to the Judge or any 3rd party mediator - what he'll see? he'll see completly 2 different implementations which give same results. I win the case and I can collect damages from CodeWeavers.
Not really. Depends on the guys who have to judge the code. And if the code is only cosmetically changed then this is quite obvious to see unless you put in quite some effort to hide it.
Your argument is also not really specific to Wine, because this is a szenario for EVERY OS code that exists.
So yes, CodeWeaver have their full right to move their code to LGPL or whatever. Is it a smart move for the Wine development move? yes. Is it a smart move business wide? IMHO - no, but CodeWeavers is a private company, and it's Jeremy full right to decide what to do with their code.
It is just as smart as for other OS projects.