4 ms·

One of the directions the company is taking to address this is to allow for running some things as a free tier on the cloud. But I think the open vs. closed so

by carlob 8y ago

One of the directions the company is taking to address this is to allow for running some things as a free tier on the cloud. But I think the open vs. closed source discussion in academic research is not really about that: lots of Mathematica code is fairly concise and highly automated. Let me make an example: suppose you're minimizing some complicated function and you claim to have found some minimum with Mathematica. Your source code looks like NMinimize[complicatedFunction[x], {x, 0}]. If I wanted to reproduce your result I would not need to use Mathematica, but access to the internals would allow me to see what tricks I need in terms of minimization method used, whether or not extended precision was necessary, etc... Being able to rerun that black box minimization independently for free is not really reproducing my result, because we might both be observing the same bug in Mathematica.

jordigh 8y ago
I believe your job depends on you defending black boxes, but black boxes have no place in science or mathematics, at least not any black boxes that we create ourselves. That's my point. I shouldn't just tell you "minimise, this function, it worked" (or it didn't, who knows why). We should both be able to see exactly what that minimisation did and why it did or did not work.
- carlob 8y ago
  I think you misread my comment. I'm agreeing with you on the importance of being able to inspect the code and I'm strongly against black boxes. Where I don't agree with you is that open-source === free and community driven. There are a myriad of hybrid models where a for-profit company releases the code, yet doesn't accept pull requests from the community. The all-or-nothing attitude that you just showed is actually a very good argument for those who are against open-sourcing within a company like ours. Do you really think a company will go from commercial to GPL in one step because: "freedom is not a spectrum"?
  - philipkglass 8y ago
    Non-free licenses that nonetheless make the source code available to licensees have long been used for scientific software. This licensing model alleviates concerns about black boxes even if it does not align with the FSF's mission. Is all Mathematica source available to licensees? Is there any additional cost for a source code license? I understand that most companies (and sometimes even research groups) need/want to maintain ownership of their software. I'm ok with that. But I'm opposed to licensing schemes like that of Gaussian, Inc. where a source code license costs more than an all-platforms site license.
    - aflag 8y ago
      It alleviates some of the concerns about black boxes, but it doesn't really help with reproducibility, as other people who don't have access to the code will not be able to reproduce the results easily. That is, they won't be able to download the original source and fully understand what's happening.
      - philipkglass 8y ago
        That's true, and it is a reason that free software with a public VCS history is really the gold standard. I've worked with enough non-commercial but restrictively licensed academic software that I'm willing to forgive commercial vendors for similar transgressions, so long as there is full source available to licensees. Though I admittedly steer clear of restrictively licensed code when at all possible now. I gave up on GAMESS and switched to really open quantum chemistry software because I tired of not having any revision history in the source tarballs, and of having to re-agree to the license every time I wanted an updated version. Also because I want to build software that can be installed in a fully scripted headless manner, and a "fill out the license agreement" step precludes that.
  - jordigh 8y ago
    There can be no compromise: we are small, independent and have very little income. You are part of a large company with hundreds of employees and millions of revenue. All we have is software freedom; if we compromise on that, we have nothing left. Also, I didn't say that producing free software meant you had to accept patches from anyone or listen to anything they said. All it means is that you no longer forbid your clients from knowing how your code works and you no longer forbid your clients from sharing that knowledge and that software with each other. You don't have to offer extra support or open up a public bug tracker. You don't even have to offer access to your repos; giving your clients the tarballs would be enough. The GPL isn't anti-commercial, but your job is structured to make you believe it is. It's possible to make a living without forbidding your clients from learning and sharing.

by carlob 8y ago

jordigh 8y ago

I believe your job depends on you defending black boxes, but black boxes have no place in science or mathematics, at least not any black boxes that we create ourselves. That's my point. I shouldn't just tell you "minimise, this function, it worked" (or it didn't, who knows why). We should both be able to see exactly what that minimisation did and why it did or did not work.

carlob 8y ago
I think you misread my comment. I'm agreeing with you on the importance of being able to inspect the code and I'm strongly against black boxes. Where I don't agree with you is that open-source === free and community driven. There are a myriad of hybrid models where a for-profit company releases the code, yet doesn't accept pull requests from the community. The all-or-nothing attitude that you just showed is actually a very good argument for those who are against open-sourcing within a company like ours. Do you really think a company will go from commercial to GPL in one step because: "freedom is not a spectrum"?
- philipkglass 8y ago
  Non-free licenses that nonetheless make the source code available to licensees have long been used for scientific software. This licensing model alleviates concerns about black boxes even if it does not align with the FSF's mission. Is all Mathematica source available to licensees? Is there any additional cost for a source code license? I understand that most companies (and sometimes even research groups) need/want to maintain ownership of their software. I'm ok with that. But I'm opposed to licensing schemes like that of Gaussian, Inc. where a source code license costs more than an all-platforms site license.
  - aflag 8y ago
    It alleviates some of the concerns about black boxes, but it doesn't really help with reproducibility, as other people who don't have access to the code will not be able to reproduce the results easily. That is, they won't be able to download the original source and fully understand what's happening.
    - philipkglass 8y ago
      That's true, and it is a reason that free software with a public VCS history is really the gold standard. I've worked with enough non-commercial but restrictively licensed academic software that I'm willing to forgive commercial vendors for similar transgressions, so long as there is full source available to licensees. Though I admittedly steer clear of restrictively licensed code when at all possible now. I gave up on GAMESS and switched to really open quantum chemistry software because I tired of not having any revision history in the source tarballs, and of having to re-agree to the license every time I wanted an updated version. Also because I want to build software that can be installed in a fully scripted headless manner, and a "fill out the license agreement" step precludes that.
- jordigh 8y ago
  There can be no compromise: we are small, independent and have very little income. You are part of a large company with hundreds of employees and millions of revenue. All we have is software freedom; if we compromise on that, we have nothing left. Also, I didn't say that producing free software meant you had to accept patches from anyone or listen to anything they said. All it means is that you no longer forbid your clients from knowing how your code works and you no longer forbid your clients from sharing that knowledge and that software with each other. You don't have to offer extra support or open up a public bug tracker. You don't even have to offer access to your repos; giving your clients the tarballs would be enough. The GPL isn't anti-commercial, but your job is structured to make you believe it is. It's possible to make a living without forbidding your clients from learning and sharing.