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Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? And still answering every xargs Stackoverflow question with

Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? And still answering every xargs Stackoverflow question with "you should use GNU Parallel" instead of answering the question? That really gets old quickly when googling for xarg answers. These are just some of the reasons I'll never use parallel. xargs is perfectly fine for most usecases, and it can do everything I need it to.

5e92cb50239222b 3y ago
I wanted to say 'not anymore', but it turns out that some distributions remove that message. https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/main/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa... Debian too (thanks to iib for pointing this out) https://salsa.debian.org/med-team/parallel/-/tree/master/debian/patches https://salsa.debian.org/med-team/parallel/-/tree/master/deb... And looks like the author is aware of both: https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/93f53f864933cc21a81a753d7a614885a230d598/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch#L116 https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa...
- iib 3y ago
  I think Debian also does this, I didn't see it when using the latest version
- ilyt 3y ago
  I kinda want to submit patch to GNU Parallel that changes "Hall of Shame" to "Hall of Heroes". But yeah, if guy wants to have the name of the app mentioned there is a BSD license for that I thin...
- raverbashing 3y ago
  - # *YOU* will be harming free software by removing the notice. You - # accept to be added to a public hall of shame by removing the - # line. That includes you, George and Andreas. The Open source way of buzzing a contestant
capableweb 3y ago
> Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? Where you get the "or pay 10000€" part from? As far as I remember, the software, unless told otherwise, asks authors of scientific papers to cite GNU parallels if they used it when writing their papers. And it doesn't force it, it's not part of the license, but asks you to do so as it's academic tradition to use citations. You could just ignore the citation and not break the license, no one would think less of you for doing so.
- akerl_ 3y ago
  https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/main/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch#L139 https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa... "If you pay 10000 EUR you should feel free to use GNU Parallel without citing."
  - bombcar 3y ago
    I read that more as a “common courtesy asks that you do X, but I’m negotiable - send a check and I won’t care about courtesy anymore.” Which is a fair enough position to take, in my opinion.
    - akerl_ 3y ago
      That's a very liberal interpretation of the reasonably plain language in the notice.
      - CuriousCosmic 3y ago
        If you read the FAQ they have regarding the citation notice for GNU Parallel, it's made clear that it is not part of the license in any way and only applies to projects that are part of/the basis for academic papers. If it does apply to your project and you don't cite, at absolute worst you could get in trouble with your university or the academic community but even then it's almost certainly going to be mild at worst. But importantly you can use the software however you want that is compatible with GPLv3. That includes ignoring or removing the citation notice without paying a cent. However just because it's legal doesn't mean it won't come with the potential for social consequences. == Is the citation notice compatible with GPLv3? == Yes. The wording has been cleared by Richard M. Stallman to be compatible with GPLv3. This is because the citation notice is not part of the license, but part of academic tradition. Therefore the notice is not adding a term that would require citation as mentioned on: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation The link only addresses the license and copyright law. It does not address academic tradition, and the citation notice only refers to academic tradition. [...] https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/tree/doc/citation-notice-faq.txt https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/tree/doc/cita... and from the GPL faq itself (which said citation FAQ references): Does the GPL allow me to add terms that would require citation or acknowledgment in research papers which use the GPL-covered software or its output? (#RequireCitation) No, this is not permitted under the terms of the GPL. While we recognize that proper citation is an important part of academic publications, citation cannot be added as an additional requirement to the GPL. Requiring citation in research papers which made use of GPLed software goes beyond what would be an acceptable additional requirement under section 7(b) of GPLv3, and therefore would be considered an additional restriction under Section 7 of the GPL. And copyright law does not allow you to place such a requirement on the output of software, regardless of whether it is licensed under the terms of the GPL or some other license. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation --- TLDR: The citation notice is a "cite it in academic works or pay me" agreement that is as legally binding as a pinky promise. You can break it without concern but some people may look negatively on that and it may come with social consequences.
dsissitka 3y ago
It's in current Fedora's: [david@pc ~]$ echo foo | parallel echo Academic tradition requires you to cite works you base your article on. If you use programs that use GNU Parallel to process data for an article in a scientific publication, please cite: Tange, O. (2023, July 22). GNU Parallel 20230722 ('Приго́жин'). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8175685 This helps funding further development; AND IT WON'T COST YOU A CENT. If you pay 10000 EUR you should feel free to use GNU Parallel without citing. More about funding GNU Parallel and the citation notice: https://www.gnu.org/software/parallel/parallel_design.html#citation-notice To silence this citation notice: run 'parallel --citation' once. foo [david@pc ~]$
- 5e92cb50239222b 3y ago
  > Tange, O. (2023, July 22). GNU Parallel 20230722 ('Приго́жин'). Looks like the latest release is named after Prigozhin. Yeah, probably that one, although I couldn't find anything in the mailing list to confirm it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Prigozhin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Prigozhin edit: all releases are named after current political events: https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/refs/ https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/refs/
  - jnsaff2 3y ago
    Looking at the release history it may be that the releases are named after some front page daily news headline or something. Even so, knowingly naming a release after a war criminal is very off-putting.
    - folmar 3y ago
      It shall not be. It is a notability indication, not endorsement, just take a look at other release names from the time of the war. Or compare to Time's "Person of the year".
      - jnsaff2 3y ago
Matl 3y ago
If you're a startup and relicensing previously open source code under a restrictive license or doing other shady things you'll get plenty of defenders to line up to say 'hey, they have to make a living somehow', but if a single guy tries to make a living via a simple message in a widely used program all hell breaks loose. What gives?
- akerl_ 3y ago
  You'll note there are also plenty of "defenders" on this page. It turns out the community is made up of people with a wide range of opinions.
  - Matl 3y ago
    Of course, but HN does tend to have a lot more patience for scrappy startups that scrappy lone, non-commercial devs from what I can observe. The question was rhetorical, I know that this place is frequented by quite a lot of people who wish to be part of the next YC batch, so they see themselves in the shoes of the startup, rather than the solo dev. Still, I don't think it should be this way.
    - akerl_ 3y ago
      I'm saying I don't think it is that way. I think you're seeing through the lens of your expectations. dang has written about this at length, but the gist is that it's very easy and tempting to see posts you disagree with more visibly and feel them more viscerally than posts you agree with.
    - ilyt 3y ago
      >Of course, but HN does tend to have a lot more patience for scrappy startups Look what parent company of HN does
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- smcleod 3y ago
  I could be wrong here and this is the first I’ve heard of this but I suspect it’s the language / way he goes about communicating. On the surface at least it comes across as a little annoying / demanding, things like him having a website where he shames people that don’t cite him by name, I suspect the ‘legal’ claims being made aren’t that solid either. Don’t get me wrong it’s a neat tool - but it’s just one in a huge ecosystem of many people’s efforts.
Matl 3y ago
> And calling that GPL? You can add any message you want into your GPL program. Also, a GPL program does not have to be free. This has nothing to do with the GPL. You can say in your program that 'by using this software you agree that you're a a cat' and license it under the GPL. That does not mean the GPL relates to cats in any way.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- 542458 3y ago
  You can add all the extra restrictions you want, but they effectively won’t do anything. Expecting both the GPL and the additional restrictions to apply is a violation of section 7 of the GPL. > All other non-permissive additional terms are considered “further restrictions” within the meaning of section 10. If the Program as you received it, or any part of it, contains a notice stating that it is governed by this License along with a term that is a further restriction, you may remove that term. Debian explains this further in their patch file.
- akerl_ 3y ago
  Can you back that up? If I put the GPL in my software and add a file next to it that says "Also you can't use this software if you make more than $100k/year", I've pretty clearly added an additional clause that's incompatible with the GPL.
  - oneshtein 3y ago
    Author of software package can revoke his license. Author can provide same package under multiple licenses, for example: GPL and proprietary license, like QT. Author may say that user A may use GPL license only, while user B may use proprietary license only.
    - akerl_ 3y ago
      Eh, this is kind of right but also not really responsive to the thread. For one thing, if the author provides the source with a GPL license to user A, and user A sends it to user B, user B has the software under a GPL'd license. The normal reason for dual licensing GPL/proprietary is so that user B can pay money to bundle the software in a non-GPL-compliant way. The author can stop licensing future releases under GPL, but they can't revoke the GPL on already-distributed software. For another, this isn't what's happening here. GNU Parallel is released under the GPL, and the author is affixing what is debatably an additional term to the GPL'd release, under the claim that it doesn't count as an additional restriction because it's "academic tradition". By the same token, I can add a clause to my software saying that rich people can't use it, because it's "hippie tradition" to stick it to The Man.
dahart 3y ago
> Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? IIRC the citation notice was cleared by Stallman as GPL compatible. I’d be surprised if anyone’s paid, I assumed that’s rhetoric to imply the value of a citation, or lack of citation, for anyone publishing scientific works. > These are just some of the reasons I’ll never use parallel. Hey I’ve actually ranted on HN before about the citation notice (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15319715 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15319715) - in part because I find the language of the notice a little misleading; it’s not tradition to write citations for tools used to conduct research, and it’s a requirement (not just tradition) to cite academic sources. If I used parallel to speed up some calculations, that doesn’t justify an academic citation. I don’t cite bash or python or C++ when I write papers either. On the other hand, if I’m writing a computer science paper about how to parallelize code, and especially if I compare it to GNU Parallel, then a citation isn’t optional, and I don’t need a guilt trip to add one, it’ll get requested in review, and rejected without. Is there even a journal publication to cite? (Edit: found it - the request is to cite an article in USENIX magazine.) So I find the notice a little irritating and I’m not sure who it’s aimed at exactly, or what the history of Ole feeling snubbed by scientists really is. Maybe some people were trying to compete with GNU Parallel and failing to cite it? Maybe Ole is paid by an organization that appreciates citations and will continue to fund development on Parallel if there’s evidence of it’s use in academia? That said, GNU Parallel really is totally awesome, the documentation is amazing, and the citation notice is a one-time thing you can silence permanently. I don’t think the notice is a good reason to never use Parallel, and I do think Parallel is worth using, FWIW.
- thomasahle 3y ago
  > it’s not tradition to write citations for tools used to conduct research. Thia is true, but it also makes it very hard for academics and PhD students who mainly write software over papers. They get no citations and eventually have to leave academia. If we had a better practice of citing central software we use - at least the academic software that wants to be cited - we could have a more flourishing ecosystem of such software funded by the universities.
  - 3y ago
philshem 3y ago
Here it’s discussed on the gnu mailing list in 2013: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/parallel/2013-11/msg00006.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/parallel/2013-11/msg00006...
tempaccount420 3y ago
Why not just cite it?
dec0dedab0de 3y ago
Spamming stack overflow is bullshit, but I'm fine with citations and selling exceptions.
daveguy 3y ago
Rush is an alternative to gnu parallel that is MIT licensed: https://GitHub.com/shenwei356/rush https://GitHub.com/shenwei356/rush As you mention xargs has parallel capabilities and gargs is Apache licensed software that fixes some of xargs shortcomings: https://GitHub.com/brentp/gargs https://GitHub.com/brentp/gargs No reason to use gnu parallel.

5e92cb50239222b 3y ago

I wanted to say 'not anymore', but it turns out that some distributions remove that message. https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/main/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa... Debian too (thanks to iib for pointing this out) https://salsa.debian.org/med-team/parallel/-/tree/master/debian/patches https://salsa.debian.org/med-team/parallel/-/tree/master/deb... And looks like the author is aware of both: https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/93f53f864933cc21a81a753d7a614885a230d598/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch#L116 https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa...

iib 3y ago
I think Debian also does this, I didn't see it when using the latest version
ilyt 3y ago
I kinda want to submit patch to GNU Parallel that changes "Hall of Shame" to "Hall of Heroes". But yeah, if guy wants to have the name of the app mentioned there is a BSD license for that I thin...
raverbashing 3y ago
- # *YOU* will be harming free software by removing the notice. You - # accept to be added to a public hall of shame by removing the - # line. That includes you, George and Andreas. The Open source way of buzzing a contestant

capableweb 3y ago

> Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? Where you get the "or pay 10000€" part from? As far as I remember, the software, unless told otherwise, asks authors of scientific papers to cite GNU parallels if they used it when writing their papers. And it doesn't force it, it's not part of the license, but asks you to do so as it's academic tradition to use citations. You could just ignore the citation and not break the license, no one would think less of you for doing so.

akerl_ 3y ago
https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/parallel/-/blob/main/0001-Remove-citation-things.patch#L139 https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/packaging/packages/pa... "If you pay 10000 EUR you should feel free to use GNU Parallel without citing."
- bombcar 3y ago
  I read that more as a “common courtesy asks that you do X, but I’m negotiable - send a check and I won’t care about courtesy anymore.” Which is a fair enough position to take, in my opinion.
  - akerl_ 3y ago
    That's a very liberal interpretation of the reasonably plain language in the notice.
    - CuriousCosmic 3y ago
      If you read the FAQ they have regarding the citation notice for GNU Parallel, it's made clear that it is not part of the license in any way and only applies to projects that are part of/the basis for academic papers. If it does apply to your project and you don't cite, at absolute worst you could get in trouble with your university or the academic community but even then it's almost certainly going to be mild at worst. But importantly you can use the software however you want that is compatible with GPLv3. That includes ignoring or removing the citation notice without paying a cent. However just because it's legal doesn't mean it won't come with the potential for social consequences. == Is the citation notice compatible with GPLv3? == Yes. The wording has been cleared by Richard M. Stallman to be compatible with GPLv3. This is because the citation notice is not part of the license, but part of academic tradition. Therefore the notice is not adding a term that would require citation as mentioned on: https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation The link only addresses the license and copyright law. It does not address academic tradition, and the citation notice only refers to academic tradition. [...] https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/tree/doc/citation-notice-faq.txt https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/tree/doc/cita... and from the GPL faq itself (which said citation FAQ references): Does the GPL allow me to add terms that would require citation or acknowledgment in research papers which use the GPL-covered software or its output? (#RequireCitation) No, this is not permitted under the terms of the GPL. While we recognize that proper citation is an important part of academic publications, citation cannot be added as an additional requirement to the GPL. Requiring citation in research papers which made use of GPLed software goes beyond what would be an acceptable additional requirement under section 7(b) of GPLv3, and therefore would be considered an additional restriction under Section 7 of the GPL. And copyright law does not allow you to place such a requirement on the output of software, regardless of whether it is licensed under the terms of the GPL or some other license. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#RequireCitation --- TLDR: The citation notice is a "cite it in academic works or pay me" agreement that is as legally binding as a pinky promise. You can break it without concern but some people may look negatively on that and it may come with social consequences.

dsissitka 3y ago

It's in current Fedora's: [david@pc ~]$ echo foo | parallel echo Academic tradition requires you to cite works you base your article on. If you use programs that use GNU Parallel to process data for an article in a scientific publication, please cite: Tange, O. (2023, July 22). GNU Parallel 20230722 ('Приго́жин'). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8175685 This helps funding further development; AND IT WON'T COST YOU A CENT. If you pay 10000 EUR you should feel free to use GNU Parallel without citing. More about funding GNU Parallel and the citation notice: https://www.gnu.org/software/parallel/parallel_design.html#citation-notice To silence this citation notice: run 'parallel --citation' once. foo [david@pc ~]$

5e92cb50239222b 3y ago
> Tange, O. (2023, July 22). GNU Parallel 20230722 ('Приго́жин'). Looks like the latest release is named after Prigozhin. Yeah, probably that one, although I couldn't find anything in the mailing list to confirm it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Prigozhin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yevgeny_Prigozhin edit: all releases are named after current political events: https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/refs/ https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/parallel.git/refs/
- jnsaff2 3y ago
  Looking at the release history it may be that the releases are named after some front page daily news headline or something. Even so, knowingly naming a release after a war criminal is very off-putting.
  - folmar 3y ago
    It shall not be. It is a notability indication, not endorsement, just take a look at other release names from the time of the war. Or compare to Time's "Person of the year".
    - jnsaff2 3y ago

Matl 3y ago

If you're a startup and relicensing previously open source code under a restrictive license or doing other shady things you'll get plenty of defenders to line up to say 'hey, they have to make a living somehow', but if a single guy tries to make a living via a simple message in a widely used program all hell breaks loose. What gives?

akerl_ 3y ago
You'll note there are also plenty of "defenders" on this page. It turns out the community is made up of people with a wide range of opinions.
- Matl 3y ago
  Of course, but HN does tend to have a lot more patience for scrappy startups that scrappy lone, non-commercial devs from what I can observe. The question was rhetorical, I know that this place is frequented by quite a lot of people who wish to be part of the next YC batch, so they see themselves in the shoes of the startup, rather than the solo dev. Still, I don't think it should be this way.
  - akerl_ 3y ago
    I'm saying I don't think it is that way. I think you're seeing through the lens of your expectations. dang has written about this at length, but the gist is that it's very easy and tempting to see posts you disagree with more visibly and feel them more viscerally than posts you agree with.
  - ilyt 3y ago
    >Of course, but HN does tend to have a lot more patience for scrappy startups Look what parent company of HN does
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
smcleod 3y ago
I could be wrong here and this is the first I’ve heard of this but I suspect it’s the language / way he goes about communicating. On the surface at least it comes across as a little annoying / demanding, things like him having a website where he shames people that don’t cite him by name, I suspect the ‘legal’ claims being made aren’t that solid either. Don’t get me wrong it’s a neat tool - but it’s just one in a huge ecosystem of many people’s efforts.

Matl 3y ago

> And calling that GPL? You can add any message you want into your GPL program. Also, a GPL program does not have to be free. This has nothing to do with the GPL. You can say in your program that 'by using this software you agree that you're a a cat' and license it under the GPL. That does not mean the GPL relates to cats in any way.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
542458 3y ago
You can add all the extra restrictions you want, but they effectively won’t do anything. Expecting both the GPL and the additional restrictions to apply is a violation of section 7 of the GPL. > All other non-permissive additional terms are considered “further restrictions” within the meaning of section 10. If the Program as you received it, or any part of it, contains a notice stating that it is governed by this License along with a term that is a further restriction, you may remove that term. Debian explains this further in their patch file.
akerl_ 3y ago
Can you back that up? If I put the GPL in my software and add a file next to it that says "Also you can't use this software if you make more than $100k/year", I've pretty clearly added an additional clause that's incompatible with the GPL.
- oneshtein 3y ago
  Author of software package can revoke his license. Author can provide same package under multiple licenses, for example: GPL and proprietary license, like QT. Author may say that user A may use GPL license only, while user B may use proprietary license only.
  - akerl_ 3y ago
    Eh, this is kind of right but also not really responsive to the thread. For one thing, if the author provides the source with a GPL license to user A, and user A sends it to user B, user B has the software under a GPL'd license. The normal reason for dual licensing GPL/proprietary is so that user B can pay money to bundle the software in a non-GPL-compliant way. The author can stop licensing future releases under GPL, but they can't revoke the GPL on already-distributed software. For another, this isn't what's happening here. GNU Parallel is released under the GPL, and the author is affixing what is debatably an additional term to the GPL'd release, under the claim that it doesn't count as an additional restriction because it's "academic tradition". By the same token, I can add a clause to my software saying that rich people can't use it, because it's "hippie tradition" to stick it to The Man.

dahart 3y ago

> Is the author still adding the "cite me or pay 10000€" notice to the output? And calling that GPL? IIRC the citation notice was cleared by Stallman as GPL compatible. I’d be surprised if anyone’s paid, I assumed that’s rhetoric to imply the value of a citation, or lack of citation, for anyone publishing scientific works. > These are just some of the reasons I’ll never use parallel. Hey I’ve actually ranted on HN before about the citation notice (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15319715 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15319715) - in part because I find the language of the notice a little misleading; it’s not tradition to write citations for tools used to conduct research, and it’s a requirement (not just tradition) to cite academic sources. If I used parallel to speed up some calculations, that doesn’t justify an academic citation. I don’t cite bash or python or C++ when I write papers either. On the other hand, if I’m writing a computer science paper about how to parallelize code, and especially if I compare it to GNU Parallel, then a citation isn’t optional, and I don’t need a guilt trip to add one, it’ll get requested in review, and rejected without. Is there even a journal publication to cite? (Edit: found it - the request is to cite an article in USENIX magazine.) So I find the notice a little irritating and I’m not sure who it’s aimed at exactly, or what the history of Ole feeling snubbed by scientists really is. Maybe some people were trying to compete with GNU Parallel and failing to cite it? Maybe Ole is paid by an organization that appreciates citations and will continue to fund development on Parallel if there’s evidence of it’s use in academia? That said, GNU Parallel really is totally awesome, the documentation is amazing, and the citation notice is a one-time thing you can silence permanently. I don’t think the notice is a good reason to never use Parallel, and I do think Parallel is worth using, FWIW.

thomasahle 3y ago
> it’s not tradition to write citations for tools used to conduct research. Thia is true, but it also makes it very hard for academics and PhD students who mainly write software over papers. They get no citations and eventually have to leave academia. If we had a better practice of citing central software we use - at least the academic software that wants to be cited - we could have a more flourishing ecosystem of such software funded by the universities.
- 3y ago

philshem 3y ago

Here it’s discussed on the gnu mailing list in 2013: https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/parallel/2013-11/msg00006.html https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/parallel/2013-11/msg00006...

tempaccount420 3y ago

Why not just cite it?

dec0dedab0de 3y ago

Spamming stack overflow is bullshit, but I'm fine with citations and selling exceptions.

daveguy 3y ago

Rush is an alternative to gnu parallel that is MIT licensed: https://GitHub.com/shenwei356/rush https://GitHub.com/shenwei356/rush As you mention xargs has parallel capabilities and gargs is Apache licensed software that fixes some of xargs shortcomings: https://GitHub.com/brentp/gargs https://GitHub.com/brentp/gargs No reason to use gnu parallel.