3 ms·

I did a little bit of googling, and you left out "there is an existing project that's in the same space". For me the AGPL in itself would be an "absolutely not

I did a little bit of googling, and you left out "there is an existing project that's in the same space". For me the AGPL in itself would be an "absolutely not", and combined with the point two bullets below that, on the grounds that "hey I'm doing work but he's getting money" that just adds insult to injury.

billziss 10y ago
Which license do you think would be acceptable for someone like you to contribute?
- Maxhy 10y ago
  I will try to not drive it to the regular Dokany/WinFSP battle :). Your problem is definitely the license and according on your own comments you already know that. Unfortunately for you, you will not fix the problem if you don't change the way you're thinking about commercial products and FOSS on Windows. If this can help you to understand the environment: almost all Dokany contributors are using it for commercial purpose, remember that it was also your case and so is my personal case btw. Let me explain the license choice (even if it was decided by the previous maintainer, I would have done the same choices here): we use LGPL license for the core/library so it can be used freely on commercial app while we still protect ourselves on unpublished core modification, and MIT license for additional programs (control, samples...) because these doesn't matter and this way it can be used as a starting point for developers. I believe this is what people are expecting on Windows (FOSS on MAC is generally worth from my experience ^^) ; but of course this means giving it to companies making business on your work. It's part of the deal. I completely understand your position as I'm also using AGPL license for other open source projects I started years ago and for those I didn't want companies to use it freely. Philosophically, to be open source is already a great decision, then the license decision is yours according to your way of thinking for your project.
  - billziss 10y ago
    Maxhy, thank you for the very valuable input.
voltagex_ 10y ago
The other interesting part is that it's a very niche product in itself. If you go off the theory that most contributors are trying to solve a problem for themselves, then people who need an FS driver are a) rare b) likely to be making a commercial product, in which case the main competitor to WinFSP isn't Dokan(y), but CBFS. The author of Expandrive could probably add more to this - his product is based off CBFS.
- billziss 10y ago
  That is a very good insight and one that I agree with. BTW, I am not really trying to make WinFsp into a product. I simply created it because I am a file system writer myself and wanted a stable FSD for Windows. I was originally planning to put it under the BSD, but I spent too much time and effort to simply give it away.

billziss 10y ago

Which license do you think would be acceptable for someone like you to contribute?

Maxhy 10y ago
I will try to not drive it to the regular Dokany/WinFSP battle :). Your problem is definitely the license and according on your own comments you already know that. Unfortunately for you, you will not fix the problem if you don't change the way you're thinking about commercial products and FOSS on Windows. If this can help you to understand the environment: almost all Dokany contributors are using it for commercial purpose, remember that it was also your case and so is my personal case btw. Let me explain the license choice (even if it was decided by the previous maintainer, I would have done the same choices here): we use LGPL license for the core/library so it can be used freely on commercial app while we still protect ourselves on unpublished core modification, and MIT license for additional programs (control, samples...) because these doesn't matter and this way it can be used as a starting point for developers. I believe this is what people are expecting on Windows (FOSS on MAC is generally worth from my experience ^^) ; but of course this means giving it to companies making business on your work. It's part of the deal. I completely understand your position as I'm also using AGPL license for other open source projects I started years ago and for those I didn't want companies to use it freely. Philosophically, to be open source is already a great decision, then the license decision is yours according to your way of thinking for your project.
- billziss 10y ago
  Maxhy, thank you for the very valuable input.

voltagex_ 10y ago

The other interesting part is that it's a very niche product in itself. If you go off the theory that most contributors are trying to solve a problem for themselves, then people who need an FS driver are a) rare b) likely to be making a commercial product, in which case the main competitor to WinFSP isn't Dokan(y), but CBFS. The author of Expandrive could probably add more to this - his product is based off CBFS.

billziss 10y ago
That is a very good insight and one that I agree with. BTW, I am not really trying to make WinFsp into a product. I simply created it because I am a file system writer myself and wanted a stable FSD for Windows. I was originally planning to put it under the BSD, but I spent too much time and effort to simply give it away.