On Fri, Jun 30, 2006 at 04:03:00PM +0200, Luis Garrido wrote: Well, that's a little more reasonable, but you still don't get realtime editing of the sampler programs (i.e. within a production environment, tweak patch parameters). In fact, if I understand correctly, one edits a soundfont using an external editor, that presumably has a preview function, and then uses the soundfont with fluidsynth. What's the problem? You're editing and playing using two different implementations of the filters, modulation, etc... The two are unlikely to sound the same, or even close to the same. Soundfonts weren't really designed for the kind of precise sampler control you get with a real hardware sampler, or kontakt, where you can cut/loop samples exactly where you want (and do so without leaving your production environment), and route modulation and effects on the fly. I don't mean to say that fluidsynth doesn't have its place, as well, just that fluidsynth and kontakt are not really intended to do the same things. As far as I can tell there are two resolutions: 1) someone works on fst to make it save kontakt's state 2) someone writes a free kontakt replacement 1) is both easier and gets you access to more software (other VSTs). 2) has the benefit of finally freeing myself from proprietary software completely, which I'd love to do. I'm happy to tackle (2) with help, but that would certainly require a lot of help. -Forest

On Fri, Jun 30, 2006 at 10:25:04AM -0400, Forest Bond wrote: 3) someone makes Linux Sampler do what Kontakt does It already does bulk of what you need; ie, triggering an audio sample on reciept of a MIDI note. See http://www.linuxsampler.org/features.html for everything else it does. Bob

(sigh, must we, really?) It depends on who you choose to side with. As defined by the FSF, no, it is not free software. If you use the freebeerian definition, "you don't have to pay its authors to use it", yes, it is. As defined by the OSI it is not open source, either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Source_Definition According to other definitions by the Wikipedia it is very much indeed open source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source_license http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_source_vs._free_software OTOH rumour has it that this may change, not sure in which direction, so it may be healthy to be cautious. In the end, there is always the possibility of forking version 0.3.3 which is pure GPL and call it HurdSoftSampler or SuftSampler (pun intended) or something like that XD Anyway, the rationale behind this restriction is quite understandable: the guys are afraid that a third party could make a commercial profit of their work without giving anything back to the OS community. It has happened before to other projects. http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_id=12912656 Peace, Luis

On Sat, 2006-07-01 at 17:43 +0200, Luis Garrido wrote: In the Linux world "free software" means free as in speech. No one uses "free software" to refer to closed source software that's given away for free. Lee

Dave Robillard wrote: It's veeeery close though. It's just using a modified GPL License which isn't clearly labelled as such. IANAL but that makes LinuxSampler illegally licensed if someone wanted to make a fuss about it. They call it GPL version 2 or 3 but it has been modified so that nullifies it AFAIK. If they don't fix it and someone does use their software to make a financial gain then it could very easily be argued that the software is licensed as GPL 2 or 3 and that makes it 100% open source. It's good to know that the core team are reviewing the current license as it would no doubt be messy for them to get caught short. -- Patrick Shirkey - Boost Hardware Ltd. Http://www.boosthardware.com Http://lau.linuxaudio.org - The Linux Audio Users guide ======================================== "Anything your mind can see you can manifest physically, then it will become reality" - Macka B

Lars Luthman wrote: So then it is definitely not open source due to the current license. I hope they fix it soon. -- Patrick Shirkey - Boost Hardware Ltd. Http://www.boosthardware.com Http://lau.linuxaudio.org - The Linux Audio Users guide ======================================== "Anything your mind can see you can manifest physically, then it will become reality" - Macka B

While the LS license wording undoubtedly admits your interpretation: "LinuxSampler is licensed under the GNU GPL license with the exception that COMMERCIAL USE of the souce code, libraries and applications is NOT ALLOWED without prior written permission by the LinuxSampler authors." I think they are referring to other kind of commercial use. As taken from the FAQ: "You are NOT ALLOWED to use LinuxSampler source code, libraries or applications in COMMERCIAL hardware or software products without prior written authorization by the authors." Probably they had in mind something like Oasys, which is based on Linux http://www.korg.com/gear/prod_info.asp?A_PROD_NO=OASYS and don't want their work to become part of a big company product without having the OSS community getting something in return. But, yeah, that clause is a royal mess and it needs to be clarified. Legalese apart, since I don't plan to sell it or to produce a platinum album, it seems to me quite open and free, even if it is not Open(tm) and Free(tm) (it would seem that the words "Open Source" are not open source, anymore, how cool is that?) At the very least I can learn a lot from the available source code, I can tweak it to my needs and I can enjoy the sounds it makes in non commercial situations (and probably in commercial ones if I understood the intentions of the authors, but I wouldn't risk it without a clearer wording of the clause in question.) And as I said before, LS 0.3.3 _is_ 100% GPL, only the CVS version is subjected to this licensing. Luis

On Sat, 2006-07-01 at 20:56 +0100, Rui Nuno Capela wrote: Noone said that. Actually yes it does, by the "official" open source definition (which is clearly what people refer to when they use the term "open source". http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php Whether or not you agree with the licensing practise, calling it "open source" is as misleading as calling MS shared source "open source". Defend the license/exception if you want, but don't intentionally mislead people about the licensing terms. -DR-

On Sun, 2006-07-02 at 00:43 +0200, Fons Adriaensen wrote: Give me a break, you and I and everyone else on this list know what "open source" means. Did you even look at the webpage before deciding to troll me this pathetically? Creating something to sell is obviously "commercial use". Duh. Redefine "open source" all you like, LS is not "open source" by the almost universally accepted definition of that term (the OSI one). That's the point I wished to make, it is an irrefutable fact, and it's been made, so I'm done with this conversation. -DR-

On Sun, Jul 02, 2006 at 12:43:06AM +0200, Fons Adriaensen wrote: Hi, I'm new to this list so please be gentle :-) (not you specifically, but I am aware that I'm about to step into the middle of a debate that has already become heated :-) Here are my thoughts... I think most concepts/products/software/phenomena etc. have names that are derived from common English words that have a common meanings. Like "LinuxSampler". This is a new term derived from existing words with common meanings. * However, note that while the intended meaning of "sampler" in this context is common, it is not the only common meaning of "sampler". - Out of respect to the person (or people) who coined the term "LinuxSampler", we recognise that as a new term, regardless of what other meanings the original words may have had. - Out of respect to everyone else, I'm sure the person (or people) who coin a new term try to use a distinctive combination of words that is not already in common use. New terms are almost always derived from existing words, and almost always take on meanings of their own, and it is pretty much difficult to find otherways of naming things, like inventing entirely new, and therefore strange-sounding, words. The term "open source" was a new term, coined in 1998, that was not previously in wide usage, hence passed the test of not choosing a combination of words that someone else had already found. Now that the term has been coined and become widely adopted for its particular meaning, we can respect it as a term in itself. One way to disrespect the term is: after the new term has become established with its new particular meaning, then claim it with different meanings. I think it happens to be easier to defend the OSI's term "open source" than it is to defend the FSF's term "free software", although I respect both terms. The term "open source" prior to 1998 was not in common use at all and only after OSI's "open source" term was coined did it become widely used and understood. Also, grammatically, "open source" might possibly be seen more clearly as a term, rather than just two words with their original meaning, because it is missing the hyphen, which would normally be there if they were just two ordinary words in a sentence. "Free software", on the other hand, has no grammatical hints to indicate that this is a special term, and it *is* possible to use those two words in a sentence without indicating the meaning assigned by the FSF. However, as Lee pointed out, in Linux circles, the meaning of "free software" should be clear, partly because Linux, and a very significant portion of software that normally runs on it (and which Linux depends on) are based on a license published by the FSF. In other words, Linux has its roots in circles where the meaning of "free software" is understood to be that initiated by RMS when he started the "free software movement" (even though Linux itself doesn't necessarily belong to that movement). Probably more obvious is that Linuxsampler's license gives the FSF's definition of "free software", and so that is the definition that should be assumed in a thread about Linuxsampler :-) I am not a Lawyer, but adding exceptions to the GPL is a tricky business since the way the exceptions interact with the rest of the license is not always clear. If Bob is correct, Linuxsampler has already made an error in forgetting (or maybe not?) to add the same exception to the notices on individual files within the project. -- Ryan Heise http://www.ryanheise.com/

On Sun, Jul 02, 2006 at 10:49:54AM +0200, Thorsten Wilms wrote: I someone states as a fact and without any qualification a certain interpretation of a text, while knowing very well that this interpretation is not what the authors of that text meant to say, that _is_ IMHO intellectual dishonesty. As I was after reading the statement I refer to. I do agree that the text in LS's README is very badly written, and this *is* a problem. The only way to get it changed is to point this out the authors. Nothing useful will result from deliberately misunderstanding it or from vilifying them. -- FA Follie! Follie! Delirio vano e' questo!

Marc-Olivier Barre wrote: AFAICT, and in the way I definitively read it, the COMMERCIAL use in the infamous linuxsampler license exception, refers ONLY to works in software and hardware (i.e. embedded software) products. Using linuxsampler for commercial *and* non-commercial music art (re)creation is not an issue. OTOH however, you MUST take special regard to the license terms of each and any of the GigaSampler files that you're loading and rendering with linuxsampler ;) Cheers. -- rncbc aka Rui Nuno Capela rncbc(a)rncbc.org

On Sun, 2006-07-02 at 08:24 -0400, Dave Phillips wrote: It sounds like the LS devs don't want people _selling_ LS? That's not what "commercial use" means (I'm not sure what "direct" commercial usage is supposed to mean). Commercial USE it just that - using the software commercially, eg. to produce an album for sale. The exception needs to be reworded to refer specifically to sale. Point is this REALLY needs to be clarified. If using LS on commercial albums etc. isn't intended to be against the terms, the phrase "commercial use" should be removed completely. Though as far as being more beneficial, I really don't think LS being less widely distributed and not in any distributions because it's not OSS is going to benefit anyone, especially since it's a project with so much potential to replace a closed app with an open one (that runs in Linux). Try and fudge the definition of 'open source' all you want, but a project with such an exception will definitely never be included in any of the major distributions, and that just hurts "us". -DR-

Andreas Kuckartz wrote: [snip] My apologies, the text is Christian's I forgot an end-quote. Just to be complete, here's the entire message, including Matt Flax's original query : Am Montag, 5. September 2005 04:40 schrieb Matt Flax: [Christian's response starts here:] I'm not a license / GPL expert, but wouldn't that sentence simply be redundant? I mean the GPL forces all derived work to be under GPL as well, doesn't it? Anyway, about the mentioned commercial exception in general: you can assume all current tarball releases of LS (up to and including 0.3.3) to be under pure GPL. It was already released as pure GPL and is already included in many distributions as pure GPL software, so don't worry about that. However we thought about changing the license in future to one which is more restrictive about commercial usage and we already placed those commercial exception notes just to be sure. The idea about such a possible new license was to allow "direct" commercial usage of LS only if the commercial actor supported this or another (important) open source project either directly by contributing code or indirectly by funding the respective project. So somebody who supported e.g. the GCC, ALSA or Jack Audio Connection Kit project might also be allowed to use LS commercially. "Commercial usage" would of course only mean products based on LS, it would of course not mean using LS e.g. for commercial music production or something. Such a license wouldn't mean anything negative for the user, but might "motivate" or force ;) more people to contribute to this or another open source project, so personally I would find such a license more beneficial (than GPL for example) for the open source community in general. Unfortunately I haven't found an existing open source license which would reflect those restrictions. Some even said this wouldn't be an open source license according to definitions of XY, but personally I think it would. So maybe we would have to write a new license, like a "Participation License" or something which might also be used by other projects in future of course. Anyway, no decision is made as of today. But would be interesting to know what you people think of it! CU Christian ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is Sponsored by the Better Software Conference & EXPO September 19-22, 2005 * San Francisco, CA * Development Lifecycle Practices Agile & Plan-Driven Development * Managing Projects & Teams * Testing & QA Security * Process Improvement & Measurement * http://www.sqe.com/bsce5sf _______________________________________________ Linuxsampler-devel mailing list Linuxsampler-devel(a)lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/linuxsampler-devel

On Mon, 2006-07-03 at 02:26 +0700, Patrick Shirkey wrote: its really rather amusing to see people speculating on what the developers of LS could or could not do, when the actual relevant "encounter" with "commercial interests" has *already* happened. it did not go well. it can be tempting to imagine that we understand the motivations of commercial organizations and can therefore offer them appropriate carrots. don't be so confident of this. both the LS developers and myself are under the terms of an NDA, so it is not possible to discuss with any relevant detail precisely what happened. but it was nasty, it was unpleasant and as i've said before, it would be better for people to not make so many assumptions about their ability to guess at what might or might happen when a commercial company shows interest in a tool like LS. --p

On Tue, 2006-07-04 at 03:51 +0700, Patrick Shirkey wrote: That does not explain why the authors signed an NDA. I think it is more likely that the "mystery company" had a (possibly vague and unlikely to hold up in court, but what free software author could afford to take it to court anyway) patent on some technique used by LinuxSampler, and threatened them with a lawsuit if the authors didn't make sure that LinuxSampler couldn't be used by some commercial competitor to the mystery company, and promised not to mention anything about the whole thing. But we are still here! -- Lars Luthman - please encrypt any email sent to me if possible PGP key: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0x04C77E2E Fingerprint: FCA7 C790 19B9 322D EB7A E1B3 4371 4650 04C7 7E2E

On Mon, Jul 03, 2006 at 05:55:11PM -0400, Paul Davis wrote: Licensing software under the GPL is giving others consent to use that software commercially in certain ways. If there was an additional agreement with this specific company that they would not use it in some of those ways, it still wouldn't stop other companies who haven't signed that additional agreement to use the software in whatever way was granted to them under the GPL. What confuses me is why the authors of the software chose to release the code under the GPL and also didn't (as it seems) want to consent to others using the software in some of the ways granted by the GPL. Do I have the wrong picture? (maybe I do, I am just going on the little information provided above.) -- Ryan Heise http://www.ryanheise.com/

I have a simple question: Which companies are (or have been) distributing LinuxSampler as part of a package also including hardware and/or proprietary software? Cheers, Andreas --- Paul Davis wrote:

On Tue, 2006-07-04 at 07:48 +0200, Andreas Kuckartz wrote: as noted liontracs do, and that means that is incumbent upon me to stress that liontracs are *not* the commercial entity that i have alluded to in my descriptions of what may or may not have taken place with LS.

On Mon, 2006-07-03 at 08:33 -0400, Paul Davis wrote: Everyone can make assumptions about what they can or can't do until the cows come home, but it's irrelevant. The point it the license needs clarification. The disclaimer in the README is along the lines of what they intend to say (judging by the previously pasted quotes). The disclaimer on the webpage clearly makes it illegal to use LS on a CD you intend to sell, or in public concerts you sell tickets to (a goal that is specifically mentioned on the About page I might add), so if that isn't the intention it should be fixed. There is no disclaimer on the source files at all, so those are pure GPL with no commercial restrictions whatsoever. What IS the license to LinuxSampler? Who knows. They certainly havn't told us. -DR-

On Mon, July 3, 2006 22:55, Dave Robillard wrote: We already know that the LS license is currently flawed. As Christian wrote explicitly, even thought the README file still has the infamous exception wording, *ALL* public releases of LinuxSampler until and including 0.3.3 *ARE* plain GPL. That last public release was more than one year ago. Since then, LinuxSampler code in CVS has changed in many pervasive ways, and AFAICT for the better, performance and feature-wise. I strongly believe (although I'm also speculating here;) the next public release of LinuxSampler, whenever it will be ready, will come with a proper open-source license. And I pretty guess it will be pure GPL but I just cannot garantee that yet ;) Now, regarding the so-called unclear license of LinuxSampler, why don't you people just read the FAQ (http://www.linuxsampler.org/faq.html), having special attention to the very first two questions? and rest relaxed at least for a while... :) Cheers. -- rncbc aka Rui Nuno Capela rncbc(a)rncbc.org

On Tue, 2006-07-04 at 09:32 +0100, Rui Nuno Capela wrote: I think you're missing the point. Current CVS LS *IS* effectively GPLed. If a company wanted to use recent CVS LS in a commercial product right now, and did, there's no way you'd be able to do anything about it. There's a bunch of files in CVS that say right in them they're GPLed, and they point to a COPYING file which is the GPL, verbatim. There's not a lawyer in the world that would say a vague webpage disclaimer or README file (neither of which you actually need to see to get at the source code) overrides that. would you put it past them? You think you're covering your ass but you're not wearing any pants ;) Cheers, -DR-

On Sun, Jul 02, 2006 at 02:37:57PM -0400, Dave Phillips wrote: Why would you allow one particular type of commercial usage which does not provide support for free software projects? What is the difference between that particular type of commercial usage, and any other type? Bob

On Sat, 2006-07-01 at 20:33 +0100, Bob Ham wrote: Definitely, at the end of the day there is no way in hell their "exception" would hold up in court, since they basically just mention it in passing on the web page. Regardless of what way the license goes, it definitely needs to be clarified. -DR-

On Sun, 2006-07-02 at 10:28 -0700, Fernando Lopez-Lezcano wrote: So I exxaggerated. :) But like Bob said, the above link points to a file that clearly says right in it that it's licensed under the GPL (v2 or later). There's a similar link for every other file in LS, provided by the LS people themselves. So, if you want a fully GPLed version of CVS LS, just go through and download every file with those links and you've got it. -DR-

On Mon, Jul 03, 2006 at 11:23:25AM +1000, Loki Davison wrote: All I can find on chionic are some old lad/lau/laa posts that indicate it is no longer maintained, but had some neat features. The site seems to be gone. Where can I get source? -Forest

Alright, I'm at least partially sold on chionic. I think that there are some usability concerns (for me, anyway), but the core features seem to be there. I would be happy to continue development (in one way or another). Anyone interested in helping? -Forest