[SciPy-dev] plotting enhancements and copyright

[Jochen Küpper]

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Cc'ed to the scipy lists. 
Should also make it into the archive.

This message is to inform the users and developers od SciPy what's
going on in politics.

The plot_window class (an earlier version of which I send to this
lists) or respective changes to plot_canvas and some further changes
to scipy.plt won't get included in scipy 'cause of politcal issues.

This is sad as it provided a first implementation of zooming and an
*useful* interface to use scipy.plt as wxWindow in other applications.

See below for more. 
Because this is new for most people I cite a little more.


Eric,

eric> 4) Do you feel strongly about the inclusion of the copyright?

For clarification: This is refering to a line at the top of the
respective source file: "#Copyright (C) 2001 Jochen Küpper"

>> Yes. The code is copyrighted by me anyway, so why not tell everybody?

eric> Ok.  Unfortunately, I am not interested in encumbering the
eric> existing code with another copyright for a single or even
eric> multiple additional features.  This sort of thing is almost
eric> never done because it can lead to major hassles in the future
eric> trying to work with the 20 people who have added feature patches
eric> and bug fixes to a file over its lifetime.

What problems are you thinking of here? Changing the license? 
What else?

eric> So I guess the best thing to do then if for you to derive a new
eric> plot_canvas class and add/override the methods you need to and
eric> place it in a new module.  

That's what I did to begin with.

eric> You can then copyright this module.

Yeah. I guess I just put it into jkext, so I can everything the way I
like it, not restricted by scipy rules.  (I do not want to argue about
these rules. I think there have to be rules and the ones that are
there are appropriate for the project from my point of view.)  The
module is GPL'ed.

eric> I guess you need to include the Enthought/BSD copyright also if
eric> any or my original code is in the modules and you plan on
eric> distributing it separately.

Yes.

eric> As for how it is handled in SciPy, I'm not sure.  We can include
eric> your module, but the zoom capability is also likely to be folded
eric> back into the original class once someone has the time to sit
eric> down and work on the graphics code (with someone having to redo
eric> your work).

It isn't hard, as I showed.
I actually spent more time to fit it into scipy than writing the stuff
in the first place:( And this while I was learning wxPython.

eric> I guess we'll need to add a policy that copyrights for patches
eric> and bug fixes will need to be assigned to the original code
eric> author or copyright holder. Contributors will be acknowledged in
eric> the THANKS file.  This is the standard practice in OS projects
eric> so I didn't feel the need to make it explicit, but I will now to
eric> prevent future confusion on the issue.  New modules can retain
eric> the authors copyright, as long as it is BSD compliant (or
eric> whatever we eventually end up with).

I think you are confusing things here. "Copyright" and "license" are
two distinct features. Any code I write I do have a copyright on, no
matter what the license is. I can give up my copyright i.e. by
transfering it to someone else, but unless I explicitely do that I'll
own the copyright. 

The license is whole different story. (I am ok with the BSD style
licens, esp. since I see that there is (good) reasoning behind it.)

Many people never write the FSF-papers. So far I am one of them. (Not
that they would seriously need mine.) 
For now I am not going to transfer my copyright on BSD licensed code
to a company, sorry.

I wish SciPy good luck!

Bye,
Jochen
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Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit                http://www.Jochen-Kuepper.de
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