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Nano is no longer a GNU project

nano-editor.org

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Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#131

Post by cm3 »

ArneBab wrote: post #100
nnutter wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think GPL2 -> GPL3 is a valid example of that. Usually it is to dual-license with a non-open-source license or some other incompatible open-source licenses. The GPL "upgrade" clause, > Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and "any later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of t…

Dual-license with a proprietary license is not allowed by the papers you sign when assigning copyright to the GNU project. »We promise to always keep the software free. This promise extends to any successors in the copyright, meaning that even if the FSF were to go away the freedom of all users to share in the contributions wouldn't.« — https://www.fsf.org/bulletin/2014/spring/copyright-assignmen... This is the diffe…

While surely better than Google or Ubuntu, the new license can still be non-proprietary but highly controversial.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#132

Post by Tomte »

_pmf_ wrote: post #95
mikegerwitz wrote: post #43

I'm on the GNU maintainers team; I want to clarify a couple things about this: First, Nano has _not_ left the GNU project; GNU Nano still does and will continue to exist. The current maintainer of GNU Nano---Chris Allegretta---was hoping to add Benno Schulenberg as a co-maintainer, citing numerous contributions by him. Unfortunately, Benno refused to accept GNU's maintainership agreement, and so was not appointed. Be…

> Benno also did not want to assign copyright to the FSF for his contributions. In Germany, you cannot legally sign away copyright (i.e. signing away your copyright is either an empty action or may even void other agreements contained in a larger contract).

I think the FSF sorted that out, although I haven't seen their paperwork. It popped up a lot some years ago, and it seemed to have been solved.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#133

Post by eximius »

gargravarr wrote: post #112
baldfat wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

vim file_foo press i for interactive and make changes then press :wq :) I have that embedded in my brain after all these years.

You forgot ESC after making changes ;) nano file_foo make changes ctrl-O-Enter - save ctrl-X-Enter - exit Simpler, I think?

Don't even need the ^O, it asks if you want to save on exit if there are modifications.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#134

Post by pekk »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #108
zx2c4 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anything about the politics involved, and I don't even use nano (vim guy myself), but I just ran this out of curiosity: zx2c4@thinkpad ~/nano $ git shortlog -sne --since '3 years ago' 1298 Benno Schulenberg 64 Chris Allegretta 6 Jordi Mallach 3 Mike Frysinger 3 Mike Scalora 2 Rishabh Dave Seems like Benno is clearly the driving force behind the project.

With a record like that I think he should be allowed to do whatever he pleases with the project.

Committing to an existing project doesn't give you exclusive license rights over the project.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#135

Post by bluejekyll »

cm3 wrote: post #120
infodroid wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it makes people less likely to want to contribute to the project, because they probably feel like they are being taken advantage of or losing some right I think it depends who the copyright is assigned to. I imagine people will have strong reservations about transferring copyright to a private company or individual. But if the copyright is assigned to a mutually trusted organisation like a FLOSS foundation then I c…

> But if the copyright is assigned to a mutually trusted organization like a FLOSS foundation then I can't think of a good reason that a contributor would withhold copyright assignment. How would one know beforehand what kind of license it will be re-licensed under in the future, and what kind of legal action that assigned copyright holder will take, which you may not agree with? You make valid arguments, but it's no…

> it's easy to argue that there's no reason for something one contributes under license X to be put under license Y two years later without consent

The problem isn't for the individual contributor, it's the project itself. Let's say for some reason you use Apache 2.0 and then decide you want to add MIT for better compatability with other license. You as the maintainer solicit from all contributors they're approval and you get 99/100, one person holds out and blocks it. What do you do in this case? Go back and remove all their contributions such that you can then continue with the general agreement?

A clause I've been considering, if it doesn't exist somewhere, is to have a majority rules portion to the agreement. But I'm not sure if this works without assigning copyright to the project.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#136

Post by pessimizer »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #108
zx2c4 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anything about the politics involved, and I don't even use nano (vim guy myself), but I just ran this out of curiosity: zx2c4@thinkpad ~/nano $ git shortlog -sne --since '3 years ago' 1298 Benno Schulenberg 64 Chris Allegretta 6 Jordi Mallach 3 Mike Frysinger 3 Mike Scalora 2 Rishabh Dave Seems like Benno is clearly the driving force behind the project.

With a record like that I think he should be allowed to do whatever he pleases with the project.

It's free software, everybody is allowed to do whatever they please with the project. GNU doesn't have to support or endorse it, though.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#137

Post by ArneBab »

Sir_Cmpwn wrote: post #108
zx2c4 wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anything about the politics involved, and I don't even use nano (vim guy myself), but I just ran this out of curiosity: zx2c4@thinkpad ~/nano $ git shortlog -sne --since '3 years ago' 1298 Benno Schulenberg 64 Chris Allegretta 6 Jordi Mallach 3 Mike Frysinger 3 Mike Scalora 2 Rishabh Dave Seems like Benno is clearly the driving force behind the project.

With a record like that I think he should be allowed to do whatever he pleases with the project.

I don’t think so. With that argument, anyone could take over any project just because he/she has more free time than the current maintainer.

Would you want someone who steps up and does a lot of work in a project you started to suddenly tell you that he/she will now change the vision of the project and turn it in ways you don’t like?

Let’s assume that you take your time to write clean code, do changes slowly and deliberately and think long about how to do something right before you start coding. Then someone steps up and does lots of cool things in a flurry of activity, but does not do them right and you already see the maintenance fallout from that approaching. Would you want that contributor to take over the project and use the name you established for this new kind of project?

As a non-programming example: I’m writing a roleplaying system, and it took me several years to get from EWS-2.6 to having the concepts for EWS-3.0 nailed down — though without having finished text. If someone came in and did lots of work, I would still not want to see an EWS-3.0 which violates core principles I set down for the system. People are free to do that, but they have to do that in their own space, not in the space I created.

Also changing the name all over the source code in the main version tracking repository is a pretty hostile step. It implies that the other one now considers the project his/her own.

Essentially Benno should have made a bano, but I think that just turning GNU nano into his own project isn’t OK.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#138

Post by ArneBab »

cm3 wrote: post #47
mikegerwitz wrote: post #43

I'm on the GNU maintainers team; I want to clarify a couple things about this: First, Nano has _not_ left the GNU project; GNU Nano still does and will continue to exist. The current maintainer of GNU Nano---Chris Allegretta---was hoping to add Benno Schulenberg as a co-maintainer, citing numerous contributions by him. Unfortunately, Benno refused to accept GNU's maintainership agreement, and so was not appointed. Be…

But if a or the driving force of a project takes things elsewhere, the users will eventually follow. If the disagreement was over GNU's insistence to require assigning copyright to the FSF, then I can fully understand the reluctance. It's the same reason many contributors cannot officially submit patches to side projects of Google employees, Ubuntu projects, etc.

It’s the current maintainer who wants copyright assignment. He does not want to hand over the project to someone who refuses to lead it in a way consistent with his vision.

Rather walk more slowly than walk in the wrong direction.

Re: Nano is no longer a GNU project

#139

Post by ryanlol »

tretiy3 wrote: post #35
bechampion wrote: post #2

don't want to sound nasty , but is anyone there using nano really ? i know it come by default in some distros but that's about it really.

I find it very convenient to open large log files bc Nano is very lightweight. Something like that: $ cat /var/log/logfile | grep -n section_start which gives me required line numbers. and then: $ nano +lineno /var/log/logfile and for configs, of course.

>I find it very convenient to open large log files bc Nano is very lightweight.

Nano seems to be far slower than vim for opening large files.

Just quickly testing on a 200M 500k row text file on a SSD:

Vim opens practically instantly.

nano takes over 10 seconds to display text, but works well after that.

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