5 ms·

Only the binaries are made available, not the source, which is interesting. I guess they don't claim to be open source, they're claiming to be free, which is -

Only the binaries are made available, not the source, which is interesting. I guess they don't claim to be open source, they're claiming to be free, which is - in itself - awesome. Last time I checked, you couldn't push binaries to maven central, without also releasing the source. That may have changed.

casion 3y ago
Maven actually has a tutorial on publishing binaries without source. So I assume it's ok when they tell you how to do it.
- martypitt 3y ago
  Sure, Maven makes this possible. But Maven Central has strict rules around what can be published there. I just double checked and it's a requirement to publish the source as well as the binaries: https://central.sonatype.org/publish/requirements/#supply-javadoc-and-sources https://central.sonatype.org/publish/requirements/#supply-ja...
  - BaculumMeumEst 3y ago
    it seems you're right, but it also says the following, so i'm confused on whether it's a hard requirement? "If, for some reason (for example, license issue or it's a Scala project), you can not provide -sources.jar or -javadoc.jar , please make fake -sources.jar or -javadoc.jar with simple README inside to pass the checking. We do not want to disable the rules because some people tend to skip it if they have an option and we want to keep the quality of the user experience as high as possible."
eternalban 3y ago
Someone (forget who but he worked there) was giving a presentation of Datomics in some downtown (NYC) bank circa 2014 iirc. Per the presenter -- iirc someone asked a specific technical question -- even people working for the company don't get to see the full source. Only a small team has access to the full source, and he said he wasn't one of them.
miroljub 3y ago
They say it's under the Apache 2 licence, so it is open source. EDIT: I was wrong. They actually released binaries under the Apache licence, not the source code. Which is, mildly said, deceptive. I don't even have an idea what that actually means.
- martypitt 3y ago
  They say the binaries are being made under Apache 2. They don't say anything about the source code being published. That's why (to me) this is so interesting. I've never seen binaries released without source code before.
  - pjmlp 3y ago
    We used to call it Public Domain and Shareware (with variations like Coffeeware, Beerware, Postware,...)
  - stefan_ 3y ago
    What is even the point of releasing binaries under Apache 2? When I patch the binaries, do I need to release a hexdiff too to fulfill my Apache obligations? Very weird.
    - politician 3y ago
      I suppose you could run it through a Java decompiler and clean up the results with an LLM. How long would that take? 5 years to make it useful?
  - vore 3y ago
    I wonder if they took a page out of Fabrice Bellard's book: https://bellard.org/ts_server/ https://bellard.org/ts_server/ The CPU version is released as binary code under the MIT license.
- a2800276 3y ago
  They licensed the binary under Apache. It's a publicity stunt.

casion 3y ago

Maven actually has a tutorial on publishing binaries without source. So I assume it's ok when they tell you how to do it.

martypitt 3y ago
Sure, Maven makes this possible. But Maven Central has strict rules around what can be published there. I just double checked and it's a requirement to publish the source as well as the binaries: https://central.sonatype.org/publish/requirements/#supply-javadoc-and-sources https://central.sonatype.org/publish/requirements/#supply-ja...
- BaculumMeumEst 3y ago
  it seems you're right, but it also says the following, so i'm confused on whether it's a hard requirement? "If, for some reason (for example, license issue or it's a Scala project), you can not provide -sources.jar or -javadoc.jar , please make fake -sources.jar or -javadoc.jar with simple README inside to pass the checking. We do not want to disable the rules because some people tend to skip it if they have an option and we want to keep the quality of the user experience as high as possible."

eternalban 3y ago

Someone (forget who but he worked there) was giving a presentation of Datomics in some downtown (NYC) bank circa 2014 iirc. Per the presenter -- iirc someone asked a specific technical question -- even people working for the company don't get to see the full source. Only a small team has access to the full source, and he said he wasn't one of them.

miroljub 3y ago

They say it's under the Apache 2 licence, so it is open source. EDIT: I was wrong. They actually released binaries under the Apache licence, not the source code. Which is, mildly said, deceptive. I don't even have an idea what that actually means.

martypitt 3y ago
They say the binaries are being made under Apache 2. They don't say anything about the source code being published. That's why (to me) this is so interesting. I've never seen binaries released without source code before.
- pjmlp 3y ago
  We used to call it Public Domain and Shareware (with variations like Coffeeware, Beerware, Postware,...)
- stefan_ 3y ago
  What is even the point of releasing binaries under Apache 2? When I patch the binaries, do I need to release a hexdiff too to fulfill my Apache obligations? Very weird.
  - politician 3y ago
    I suppose you could run it through a Java decompiler and clean up the results with an LLM. How long would that take? 5 years to make it useful?
- vore 3y ago
  I wonder if they took a page out of Fabrice Bellard's book: https://bellard.org/ts_server/ https://bellard.org/ts_server/ The CPU version is released as binary code under the MIT license.
a2800276 3y ago
They licensed the binary under Apache. It's a publicity stunt.