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Seems likely. It's not like objective-c is closed to other people, and the extensions to Objective-C that Apple has made are open. Swift and Objective-C are b

by MCRed 12y ago

Seems likely. It's not like objective-c is closed to other people, and the extensions to Objective-C that Apple has made are open. Swift and Objective-C are based on LLVM, which Apple has supported since very early on, and which is open sourced itself. It would be kinda out of character for Apple (the real Apple not the boogeyman Apple which is mostly a straw man) to not release a programming language as open source. Hell, the core of OS X (and iOS) is open source... they've only kept the UI layer closed source (notice Google has not open sourced their platform- map reduce, page rank, everything related to source they kept closed source. They only open sourced Android to try and be the Netscape Navigator to Apples Internet Explorer (iOS). Note that like Android, Navigator was free. Only after netscape ended did it become firefox, which is open source. Google shares android source, but to be official "Android" you have to license it from google, and that comes with a lot of requirements. So, Android is more properly understood as free)

chc 12y ago
Nobody at Apple has expressed any intention to make Swift free. Zero. Zip. You might call this "out of character," but the actual actions that they've taken in the real world have been to make Swift proprietary and turn away requests to open it up. Those are the facts, not a "boogeyman."
- 3JPLW 12y ago
  This is false. > "You can imagine that many of us want [Swift] to be open source and part of llvm, but the discussion hasn't happened yet, and won't for some time." - Chris Lattner, LLVMDev mailing list. http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2014-June/073698.html http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2014-June/073698....
  - chc 12y ago
    This is strange. You just quoted Chris Lattner saying Apple has no intention of making it open-source, but said it makes me wrong. Indeed, he confirmed that it hadn't even been considered at that time.
    - austinz 12y ago
      The sentence preceding that one reads: > We literally have not even discussed this [open-sourcing] yet, because we have a ton of work to do to respond to the huge volume of feedback we're getting, and have to get a huge number of things (e.g. access control!) done before the 1.0 release this fall. If you take Chris Lattner at face value, he is saying the reason the discussion hasn't happened is because they have too much other stuff to do (as opposed to Apple being indifferent or opposed to said discussion taking place).
      - chc 12y ago
        So, again we have Lattner saying that Apple hasn't even considered releasing it as open-source. Still not seeing the part where Apple is going to open-source it. Also, he said they have stuff to do before the release this fall. That happened, and still not a word about it. I don't see how you can possibly take this "We haven't even talked about it and I can't say when we will" as a declaration that Swift will be open-sourced. It is the opposite. It isn't a firm denial that it will ever be opened up, but it is definitely a denial of any plans to do so.
    - mcphage 12y ago
      Your statement: > Nobody at Apple has expressed any intention to make Swift free. Zero. Zip. Chris Lattner: > "You can imagine that many of us want [Swift] to be open source and part of llvm" So Chris Lattner (who works for Apple) has stated that he, and many others at Apple, want to make it open source. I'm not sure what else you're looking for.
      - chc 12y ago
        I want a Tesla. Based on me saying this, do you think that I'm definitely going to buy a Tesla? Well, I am not, because I haven't got the money. A statement of personal desire on the part of one individual is different from a statement of intention or interest on the part of Apple. Lattner specifically says alongside his personal desire that they haven't even considered open-sourcing Swift. So what am I looking for? A statement to the effect that Apple will open-source Swift.
krschultz 12y ago
A lot more than just the UI layer is closed source. Where is the Core Data source?
- aaronbrethorst 12y ago
  Where is the Core Data source? I'm pretty sure it's sealed in a wooden box—right next to the Ark of the Covenant—in that warehouse you see at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. * Core Data uses exceptions for control flow: http://restkit.tumblr.com/post/40736602228/dealing-with-core-data-phantom-breakpoints http://restkit.tumblr.com/post/40736602228/dealing-with-core... * "iCloud with Core Data is a developer’s worst nightmare" http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/26/4148628/why-doesnt-icloud-just-work http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/26/4148628/why-doesnt-icloud-... * Apple's documentation is a joke: http://thermal-core.com/2013/09/07/in-defense-of-core-data-part-I.html http://thermal-core.com/2013/09/07/in-defense-of-core-data-p... * The object graph model is a problematic abstraction for a lot of what we want to do with a persistence framework: http://inessential.com/2010/02/26/on_switching_away_from_core_data http://inessential.com/2010/02/26/on_switching_away_from_cor... (NSBatchUpdateRequest doesn't do me much good since I can't drop support for iOS 7.x, or 6.x for that matter, yet) I could go on, but you get the idea...
valarauca1 12y ago
>It's not like objective-c is closed to other people, and the extensions to Objective-C that Apple has made are open. When Objective-C was developed in 86 it was closed source. NeXT purchased it (in 88, still closed), and planed to keep it closed source. Orginal Obj-C would be parsed into byte code to be compiled by the GCC, not directly parsed. GNU didn't agree with this (adding a way to compile byte code). Eventually The FSF/GNU sued them over this because the Objective-C compiler was simply a modification of the GCC, without code contributed back to the GCC. Thus, it was open sourced. As the Clang/LLVM toolchain removes "FSF lawsuits" from possible things that could happen. I think its unlikely we'll see Swift be open sourced.
- chipotle_coyote 12y ago
  As the Clang/LLVM toolchain removes "FSF lawsuits" from possible things that could happen. That toolchain nonetheless appears to be open sourced, so I'm not convinced it stands as evidence that Apple won't open source Swift. (Not that it stands as evidence that they will, either.) Wikipedia's telling of GNU and Objective-C's history sounds somewhat less combative than yours. According to Richard Stallman, "NeXT proposed to distribute a modified GCC in two parts and let the user link them. Jobs asked me whether this was lawful. It seemed to me at the time that it was, but since the result was very undesirable for free software, I said I would have to ask the lawyer. What the lawyer said surprised me; he said that judges would consider such schemes to be 'subterfuges' and would be very harsh toward them. So I went back to Jobs and said we believed his plan was not allowed by the GPL." There's no suggestion that the FSF ever sued NeXT; Stallman's own description boils down to "We told them they couldn't do that, and they said okay and made it free."
  - valarauca1 12y ago
    The tool chain was developed in academia for 6 years before they adopted [1]. With an incredibly pervasive BSD-esque license [2]. Thus, companies can use the code without giving themselves back. This is why Sony uses BSD based OS on the playstation [3]. Its cheap, they can modify it, and keep what changes they deem necessary. And yes, I'm aware Apple has given back to the project. But it seems pretty obvious why they don't use the GCC when you consider how hard Apple has tried to purge the GPL from its OS [4]. And the legal battle NeXT had with the FSF/GNU [5]. I stand by, we won't see Apple open source it. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LLVM http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LLVM [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois/NCSA_Open_Source_License http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois/NCSA_Ope... [3] http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU1MzA http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU1MzA [4] http://meta.ath0.com/2012/02/05/apples-great-gpl-purge/ http://meta.ath0.com/2012/02/05/apples-great-gpl-purge/ [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C#Popularization_through_NeXT http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C#Popularization_thro...
icebraining 12y ago
You contradict yourself, saying that Firefox is open source but Android is only "free" since it has trademark restrictions, when Firefox also has trademark restrictions (which is why Debian renamed it Iceweasel). Android doesn't just have the source available; it fulfills the criteria set both by the OSI and the FSF. That you can't make a derivative and pass it off as the original doesn't change that.
- ubernostrum 12y ago
  Define the term "Android". And in so doing you might discover the problem.
vtbassmatt 12y ago
Your analogy to IE and Netscape Navigator confuses me. Navigator cost money and was the dominant browser; IE came along later, was free, and became dominant. Eventually Netscape lowered the price to zero but by then was effectively out of business. From where I'm sitting, Android is more like the "IE" to Apple's "Navigator", only it doesn't look like Apple's going to go out of business any time soon.

by MCRed 12y ago

chc 12y ago

Nobody at Apple has expressed any intention to make Swift free. Zero. Zip. You might call this "out of character," but the actual actions that they've taken in the real world have been to make Swift proprietary and turn away requests to open it up. Those are the facts, not a "boogeyman."

3JPLW 12y ago
This is false. > "You can imagine that many of us want [Swift] to be open source and part of llvm, but the discussion hasn't happened yet, and won't for some time." - Chris Lattner, LLVMDev mailing list. http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2014-June/073698.html http://lists.cs.uiuc.edu/pipermail/llvmdev/2014-June/073698....
- chc 12y ago
  This is strange. You just quoted Chris Lattner saying Apple has no intention of making it open-source, but said it makes me wrong. Indeed, he confirmed that it hadn't even been considered at that time.
  - austinz 12y ago
    The sentence preceding that one reads: > We literally have not even discussed this [open-sourcing] yet, because we have a ton of work to do to respond to the huge volume of feedback we're getting, and have to get a huge number of things (e.g. access control!) done before the 1.0 release this fall. If you take Chris Lattner at face value, he is saying the reason the discussion hasn't happened is because they have too much other stuff to do (as opposed to Apple being indifferent or opposed to said discussion taking place).
    - chc 12y ago
      So, again we have Lattner saying that Apple hasn't even considered releasing it as open-source. Still not seeing the part where Apple is going to open-source it. Also, he said they have stuff to do before the release this fall. That happened, and still not a word about it. I don't see how you can possibly take this "We haven't even talked about it and I can't say when we will" as a declaration that Swift will be open-sourced. It is the opposite. It isn't a firm denial that it will ever be opened up, but it is definitely a denial of any plans to do so.
  - mcphage 12y ago
    Your statement: > Nobody at Apple has expressed any intention to make Swift free. Zero. Zip. Chris Lattner: > "You can imagine that many of us want [Swift] to be open source and part of llvm" So Chris Lattner (who works for Apple) has stated that he, and many others at Apple, want to make it open source. I'm not sure what else you're looking for.
    - chc 12y ago
      I want a Tesla. Based on me saying this, do you think that I'm definitely going to buy a Tesla? Well, I am not, because I haven't got the money. A statement of personal desire on the part of one individual is different from a statement of intention or interest on the part of Apple. Lattner specifically says alongside his personal desire that they haven't even considered open-sourcing Swift. So what am I looking for? A statement to the effect that Apple will open-source Swift.

krschultz 12y ago

A lot more than just the UI layer is closed source. Where is the Core Data source?

aaronbrethorst 12y ago
Where is the Core Data source? I'm pretty sure it's sealed in a wooden box—right next to the Ark of the Covenant—in that warehouse you see at the end of Raiders of the Lost Ark. * Core Data uses exceptions for control flow: http://restkit.tumblr.com/post/40736602228/dealing-with-core-data-phantom-breakpoints http://restkit.tumblr.com/post/40736602228/dealing-with-core... * "iCloud with Core Data is a developer’s worst nightmare" http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/26/4148628/why-doesnt-icloud-just-work http://www.theverge.com/2013/3/26/4148628/why-doesnt-icloud-... * Apple's documentation is a joke: http://thermal-core.com/2013/09/07/in-defense-of-core-data-part-I.html http://thermal-core.com/2013/09/07/in-defense-of-core-data-p... * The object graph model is a problematic abstraction for a lot of what we want to do with a persistence framework: http://inessential.com/2010/02/26/on_switching_away_from_core_data http://inessential.com/2010/02/26/on_switching_away_from_cor... (NSBatchUpdateRequest doesn't do me much good since I can't drop support for iOS 7.x, or 6.x for that matter, yet) I could go on, but you get the idea...

valarauca1 12y ago

>It's not like objective-c is closed to other people, and the extensions to Objective-C that Apple has made are open. When Objective-C was developed in 86 it was closed source. NeXT purchased it (in 88, still closed), and planed to keep it closed source. Orginal Obj-C would be parsed into byte code to be compiled by the GCC, not directly parsed. GNU didn't agree with this (adding a way to compile byte code). Eventually The FSF/GNU sued them over this because the Objective-C compiler was simply a modification of the GCC, without code contributed back to the GCC. Thus, it was open sourced. As the Clang/LLVM toolchain removes "FSF lawsuits" from possible things that could happen. I think its unlikely we'll see Swift be open sourced.

chipotle_coyote 12y ago
As the Clang/LLVM toolchain removes "FSF lawsuits" from possible things that could happen. That toolchain nonetheless appears to be open sourced, so I'm not convinced it stands as evidence that Apple won't open source Swift. (Not that it stands as evidence that they will, either.) Wikipedia's telling of GNU and Objective-C's history sounds somewhat less combative than yours. According to Richard Stallman, "NeXT proposed to distribute a modified GCC in two parts and let the user link them. Jobs asked me whether this was lawful. It seemed to me at the time that it was, but since the result was very undesirable for free software, I said I would have to ask the lawyer. What the lawyer said surprised me; he said that judges would consider such schemes to be 'subterfuges' and would be very harsh toward them. So I went back to Jobs and said we believed his plan was not allowed by the GPL." There's no suggestion that the FSF ever sued NeXT; Stallman's own description boils down to "We told them they couldn't do that, and they said okay and made it free."
- valarauca1 12y ago
  The tool chain was developed in academia for 6 years before they adopted [1]. With an incredibly pervasive BSD-esque license [2]. Thus, companies can use the code without giving themselves back. This is why Sony uses BSD based OS on the playstation [3]. Its cheap, they can modify it, and keep what changes they deem necessary. And yes, I'm aware Apple has given back to the project. But it seems pretty obvious why they don't use the GCC when you consider how hard Apple has tried to purge the GPL from its OS [4]. And the legal battle NeXT had with the FSF/GNU [5]. I stand by, we won't see Apple open source it. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LLVM http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LLVM [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois/NCSA_Open_Source_License http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Illinois/NCSA_Ope... [3] http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU1MzA http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=MTU1MzA [4] http://meta.ath0.com/2012/02/05/apples-great-gpl-purge/ http://meta.ath0.com/2012/02/05/apples-great-gpl-purge/ [5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C#Popularization_through_NeXT http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objective-C#Popularization_thro...

icebraining 12y ago

You contradict yourself, saying that Firefox is open source but Android is only "free" since it has trademark restrictions, when Firefox also has trademark restrictions (which is why Debian renamed it Iceweasel). Android doesn't just have the source available; it fulfills the criteria set both by the OSI and the FSF. That you can't make a derivative and pass it off as the original doesn't change that.

ubernostrum 12y ago
Define the term "Android". And in so doing you might discover the problem.

vtbassmatt 12y ago

Your analogy to IE and Netscape Navigator confuses me. Navigator cost money and was the dominant browser; IE came along later, was free, and became dominant. Eventually Netscape lowered the price to zero but by then was effectively out of business. From where I'm sitting, Android is more like the "IE" to Apple's "Navigator", only it doesn't look like Apple's going to go out of business any time soon.