Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S265858AbTFSRXf (ORCPT ); Thu, 19 Jun 2003 13:23:35 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S265859AbTFSRXf (ORCPT ); Thu, 19 Jun 2003 13:23:35 -0400 Received: from [65.244.37.61] ([65.244.37.61]:55726 "EHLO WSPNYCON1IPC.corp.root.ipc.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S265858AbTFSRXc (ORCPT ); Thu, 19 Jun 2003 13:23:32 -0400 Message-ID: <170EBA504C3AD511A3FE00508BB89A920234CD34@exnanycmbx4.ipc.com> From: "Downing, Thomas" To: "'linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org'" Subject: Troll Tech [was RE: Sco vs. IBM] Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2003 13:37:28 -0400 MIME-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2650.21) Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Content-Length: 1789 Lines: 42 I'm no authority, but IMHO > In article <20030619141443.GR29247@fs.tum.de>, > Adrian Bunk wrote: > >There's no license reason today why there are two big > desktop projects > >(GNOME and KDE). > > There is. If you want to develop a commercial application under > KDE you need to pay TrollTech for the Qt license. Basically > TrollTech controls all commercial KDE applications. No, you don't, IFF you distribute the source code. Doesn't make a lot of sense though. So consider, a for-profit company licenses QT for a proprietary app. They send bug fixes/enhancements to QT to TrollTech. If these migrate to Free QT, you're ahead of the game. If they don't, what did you lose? > Which makes no sense. You're not at the mercy of Linus or the > kernel developers, neither at that of the KDE developers, but > TrollTech controls the KDE desktop wrt commercial apps. No, they don't. KDE uses the GPL for QT. If I build a commercial app using KDE, it is GPL. If I build a commercial app not using KDE, but using commercial QT, that has no effect on the KDE desktop. > What if TrollTech decides to only license (or sell) Qt > to, say, Microsoft? What does that mean for, say, the Kompany ? They can't. They released the code under GPL. They can stop maintaining that code, and continue on a proprietary track. If they did, what did you lose? In summary, QT -> GPL, GNOME - GPL, what about _that_ makes one or the other inherently preferable or better? P.S. for once I am in complete agreement with larry m. ;-) - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/