Re: Xandros review

[Jeff Licquia <jeff@licquia.org>]

On Wed, 2003-01-08 at 14:47, mike808@users.sourceforge.net wrote:
> I'm looking into asking Xandros and Codeweavers to clarify the license terms, 
> but since it doesn't come with support, (which is one thing you get when you 
> send the $50 directly to Codeweavers), I wondered if I could use my 
> Crossover license to install it in another Linux OS partition on a 
> multi-boot system. 

The CodeWeavers license should be a part of the Xandros license, or
should otherwise be available as a part of the system.  Debian policy
requires all packages to store their licensing terms in
/usr/share/doc/<package>/copyright, but I doubt Xandros has that
together for their custom stuff.

If you can find where the CrossOver programs are, the license should be
in the same place somewhere as "license.txt".

> I'm still only using one copy at a time, and all 
> partitions are properly licensed Linux OSes. Gotta love the GPL. License
> management is simple: 1. Do you have a copy? 2. Can you get the source code?
> If your answer was "Yes" to both of these, then you are properly licensed.
> Time to go play in the yard until the Micro$ofties finish their "audit".

Like that's true anymore for any of the commercial distros.

Red Hat has EULAs for lots of their stuff.  Caldera/SCO lusts after
per-seat licensing.  Legions of distributors violate the GPL in their
"beta" versions with things like NDAs; only some bother to fix the
problem.  Corel, by the way, was particularly noxious in this regard;
their beta was age-restricted, which denied a number of their primary
developers (from Debian) the right to run it at all.  And, of course,
Xandros is Corel, basically.

The problem is third-party non-free add-ons that aren't clearly
identified as such, and that aren't optional.  While you may
theoretically have lots of rights under the GPL and other licenses, you
can't exercise them through the regular installer, because it installs
this other stuff.  Sure, you're free to boot a rescue disk, format an
ext2 partition manually, and unpack scads of RPMs yourself that you've
verified are clear of encumbrances, but who does that?  (Well, I have
with debs, but you know.)  Even the much-maligned Debian installer is
easier than that, and Debian now has alternatives (one of which I'm
proud to be a developer on).

Only one distribution I know of considers the distinction between free
and restrictive software in their distro to be important: Debian.  And
we've been slammed over and over for how picky we are on that score. 
But I can tell you, right now, what my rights are with every piece of
software on every Debian system I run.  Unless you run Debian or you're
very careful, you probably can't.

> Since the OS contingent is frothing at the mouth over Microsoft's EULA
> tying "components", such as Media Player, to only be licensed for use
> on a licensed MS OS, I thought I'd pose the question "How well does the 
> other shoe fit?" when applied to the Linux world.

Well, it's hard to make a comparison here.  Microsoft is trying to force
people via legal means to keep buying their OSes, even in the face of
their monopolistic control of the market.  CodeWeavers hardly has a
monopoly in any area, largely because of their own open attitudes
regarding rolling technology back into the free Wine project.

Call me when Xandros has 90% market share and is legally declared a
monopoly in federal court.  (Heh.  That's a call that'll never happen.)

> Is Codeweaver in the same camp as Microsoft if they only allow Crossover
> to be licensed for one OS, and a specific one at that, using the same
> EULA tactics as Microsoft? Or, if licensed for one "machine", what's the
> impact for clusters? Microsoft doesn't have this issue, because, well,
> they don't cluster in a useful way in the first place.

My copy of CrossOver Plugin has this clause in the license:

    a) run the Software on any computer, so long as no more than one person
per license is using the Software at one time.

>From that, it seems that CodeWeavers might be cool with you installing
the CrossOver stuff on your other dual-boot, so long as you don't run X
terminals off any of the OS partitions with CrossOver.  Of course,
that's my license, not yours.

> BTW, I will prognosticate a bit and say that I think Xandros will have
> the best "deal" with Codeweavers. Why? Well, it seems that an
> investment firm called Linux Global Partners owns Xandros, and also has a 
> significant stake in Codeweavers. Can you say "synergy"?

I have my own reasons for doubting this.

> And the more I use Xandros, the more I like it as "the distro your mother could 
> use". Everything is simplified, so there's no bewildering choices for
> software you don't know what it is. It's also clearly oriented to a desktop
> office/SOHO installation. It's not your fax/uucp/ssh/firewall/webserver 
> all-rolled-into-one do-everything distro like the others.
> 
> But, being Debian-based, you're free to drop the OS and application support
> (only available for apps installed from Xandros-shipped media and updated 
> from Xandros servers - aka Xandros Networks), and use the nice apt GUI to
> install whatever packages from whatever Debian flavor that you like.

I haven't run any of the new desktop-oriented distros, but I can tell
you who the clear winner is in terms of cooperation and coordination of
effort within the open source community: Lindows.  I can tell you this
from past personal experience.  They and Progeny are literally the only
Debian-based distros who have expressed their presence positively in any
significant way to Debian.

Not only that, but their CEO has a good track record of doing successful
cool stuff.  That's more than I can say for the others.

> Xandros is looking to lean in favor of KDE for the desktop GUI, which 
> makes sense, given that WINE and Crossover technology are also based on QT.

Wine and CrossOver are not based on Qt in any way that I can detect.

Furthermore, if they are, it would be a very recent development. 
Historically, Wine (which is the underlying technology behind both
CodeWeavers and TransGaming) has always maintained its own widget set. 
It's not particularly tied to either KDE or GNOME, though it tries to
play nice with both of them.

Xandros/Corel has been KDE/Qt based, though, from the very beginning.

-- 
Jeff Licquia <jeff@licquia.org>

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