Review of Chrony

[Mario Xerxes Castelán Castro]

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October 9th 2009

I have reviewed the proyect Chrony
(https://savannah.gnu.org/task/?9774) arcording to "How to get your
project approved quickly", i found some detalis of concern:

First, the proyect is GNU GPL 2 only, so there will be a lot of
licence compatiblilities problems as most programas now are GNU GPL
3 or later, who is AFIK incompatible with GNU GPL 2.

Second, some files lacks the correct licence header, like the man
pages and is not clear wath licence have the files in contrib/.

Third and last, there is no menction to the GNU movement only to the
linux kernel, the program do not talk about open source software (Than
misses the point) but nor about the free software movement..

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[Mario Xerxes Castelán Castro]

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>> First, the project is GNU GPL 2 only...

> That is not likely to change: certainly not in the immediate future.

>> ...so there will be a lot of licence compatiblilities problems as
>> most programas now are GNU GPL 3 or later, who is AFIK incompatible
>> with GNU GPL 2.

> Chrony doesn't link to much of anything so that is irrelevant.

Is not irrelevant, in free software is very important than you can
take the whole or a part of a project and merge with another. Using
GPL 2 only you prevent pepole to take a part of Chrony and merge with
another project under the GPL 3 (Or later).

>> Second, some files lacks the correct licence header, like the man
>> pages and is not clear wath licence have the files in contrib/.

> That is true of almost every Free Software package I have looked at.
> It will be fixed eventually.

The fact than most free software package lacks that headers (Wath is
not the case of the software i readed) do not imply than is ok to no
put it. It is not a ethic problem but _can_ be a legal one, IMO is
better to be sure

>> Third and last, there is no menction to the GNU movement only to
>> the linux kernel, the program do not talk about open source
>> software (Than misses the point) but nor about the free software
>> movement..

> it's software, not propaganda.  I had the evidently erroneous
> impression that the purpose of nongnu.org was to host Free Software
> projects that were not part of the GNU project.

AFAIR, the propose of nongnu.org is that, host free software but no
GNU projects; i only sugest to menction the free software movement in
Chrony, not to turn it a propaganda.

> I'm sorry that you find our project unacceptable.  I don't like
> SourceForge, but it looks like that is where we will end up.

You can host you project where you want, but you must know than source
forge is unethical: http://www.fsf.org/blogs/community/savannah

My comment represents my opinion, not nessesry the GNU proyect
opinion, nor the most savannah hackers opinion, i just like to help in
the (dis)approval process of pending savannah projects. I are judging
acording to my interpretation (Than can be wrong of course) of "How to
get you proyect approved quickly"
(https://savannah.gnu.org/maintenance/HowToGetYourProjectApprovedQuickly).
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[John Hasler-3]

Mario Castelán Castro writes:
> Is not irrelevant, in free software is very important than you can
> take the whole or a part of a project and merge with another. Using
> GPL 2 only you prevent pepole to take a part of Chrony and merge with
> another project under the GPL 3 (Or later).

As some of us consider GPL 3 to be overreaching and possibly at risk of
being found to be copyright abuse, that is not all bad.

> AFAIR, the propose of nongnu.org is that, host free software but no
> GNU projects; i only sugest to menction the free software movement in
> Chrony, not to turn it a propaganda.

You made it sound like a requirement for approval.  If it isn't, why
mention it?

> My comment represents my opinion, not nessesry the GNU proyect
> opinion, nor the most savannah hackers opinion, i just like to help in
> the (dis)approval process of pending savannah projects. I are judging
> acording to my interpretation (Than can be wrong of course) of "How to
> get you proyect approved quickly"

I took your letter to be an official response to my application.  Is
that not the case?  If not, when can I expect an official response and
how will I know it when I see it?  (Though it may already be too late: I
showed your letter to the other Chrony developers and the reaction was
extremely negative).
--
John Hasler
jhasler@...
Elmwood, WI USA

[Mario Xerxes Castelán Castro]

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>> Mario Castelán Castro writes:

>> It depends wath you consider "official", since here all us are
>> volunteers...

> Whether you are paid, unpaid, or conscripted is irrelevant as to
> whether or not you have authority or responsibility.  Are you acting
> on behalf of Savannah, or just expressing your personal opinion?

As i alredy say, my opinion do not nessesary represent the Savannah
director (Sylvain Beucler), nor Free Sofrware Foundation director
(Richard Stallman).

>> Wath i are doing here is to send a review of your project so
>> administratos can decide easier if approval or disaproval
>> Chrony. And telling you the poins than can lead aministratos to the
>> approval.

> Will your opinions influence these nameless administrators?  Do you
> have any idea when I can expect to hear from them?  Our present
> hosting has been discontinued.

I expect than my comments and your comments will help administrators
to decide what to do with Chrony. Of course i can't warranty that
since the (dis)approval of Chrony do not belongs to me.

The names of the administrators are here:
https://savannah.gnu.org/project/memberlist.php?group=administration. For
live talking you can also found some of then on the #savannah channel
in the freenode network (Server is irc.freenode.net or use the webchat
interface: http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=savannah).
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[Sylvain Beucler-2]

Hi,

Mario: since you are learning how to approve projects, please do not
send a copy to the project submitter until we have discussed your
review with you.

We'll check your review later today :)

--
Sylvain

On Fri, Oct 09, 2009 at 11:01:54PM -0500, Mario Castelán Castro wrote:

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>
> >> Mario Castelán Castro writes:
>
> >> It depends wath you consider "official", since here all us are
> >> volunteers...
>
> > Whether you are paid, unpaid, or conscripted is irrelevant as to
> > whether or not you have authority or responsibility.  Are you acting
> > on behalf of Savannah, or just expressing your personal opinion?
>
> As i alredy say, my opinion do not nessesary represent the Savannah
> director (Sylvain Beucler), nor Free Sofrware Foundation director
> (Richard Stallman).
>
> >> Wath i are doing here is to send a review of your project so
> >> administratos can decide easier if approval or disaproval
> >> Chrony. And telling you the poins than can lead aministratos to the
> >> approval.
>
> > Will your opinions influence these nameless administrators?  Do you
> > have any idea when I can expect to hear from them?  Our present
> > hosting has been discontinued.
>
> I expect than my comments and your comments will help administrators
> to decide what to do with Chrony. Of course i can't warranty that
> since the (dis)approval of Chrony do not belongs to me.
>
> The names of the administrators are here:
> https://savannah.gnu.org/project/memberlist.php?group=administration. For
> live talking you can also found some of then on the #savannah channel
> in the freenode network (Server is irc.freenode.net or use the webchat
> interface: http://webchat.freenode.net/?channels=savannah).
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[John Hasler-3]

Can you give me any estimate as to when we can expect action on this
application?
--
John Hasler
jhasler@...
Elmwood, WI USA

[John Hasler-3]

Cancel the Chrony application.
--
John Hasler
jhasler@...
Elmwood, WI USA