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RE: [XaraXtreme-dev] Ping



I agree with Rob on all points.

The linux version is good, but I'm sure community (including myself)
will not pickup until everything is open-sourced. 
I like XaraX (in fact, I also bought the Windows version and am still
considering buying Pro). I would certainly invest if XaraX Pro would be
migrated to linux as a commercial product. 

Regards,
Erik-Berndt Scheper


-----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
Van: owner-dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Namens Rob Kendrick
Verzonden: donderdag 15 februari 2007 16:25
Aan: dev@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Onderwerp: RE: [XaraXtreme-dev] Ping


On Thu, 2007-02-15 at 15:03 +0000, Charles Moir wrote:
> > But the BIG question is still; what about CDRAW?
> 
> But why is this the big question?
> 
> The source code of all the product is available with the exception of 
> CDraw rendering core. This doesn't stop the product working. We make 
> the binary of this available for free to be distributed with Xara 
> Xtreme. (And increasing numbers of distros are distributing completely

> closed source products such as Flash Player and Adobe Reader, and most

> Linux users have these installed even where they are not distributed 
> as part of the OS). The lack of CDraw source code certainly doesn't 
> stop Xtreme being progressed and developed by any interested 
> developers if they were interested in helping us progress the product.

Actually, no - I think you're wrong.  Many people in the open source
world will take it much more seriously, and be more likely to help out
if it doesn't have any non-free dependencies.  Infact, it's becomming
increasingly like people are beginning to consider Xara's offer as
half-hearted :-/  (Not that I count myself among those who hold that
belief.)

> So isn't it a bit of red-herring to be focussed on this small part 
> only?

Most open-source people find the devil is in the details.

> We've held back on CDraw partly because it's simply not necessary to 
> have the source code of this to develop, improve, fix bugs, add new 
> features or all the other things that I'd imagine most users would be 
> looking for. It's obvious this part is complete, and works perfectly 
> well (as you can tell using the product), so why the fixation on 
> CDraw?

For the above reasons.  That, and distributions like Debian, Ubuntu,
etc, build on, run on, and support platforms other than the ones you
provide the binary lump for.

B.


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