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Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

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81–90 of 122 posts

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#81

Wow, this _open letter_ is so full of nerd rage that it fails to capture any of my sympathy. I expected to see a humble effort to create an open-source Swift compiler that would move the conversation forward. Instead, I'm left feeling this effort is out of spite alone. All of this before Apple has made any final decision on the matter one way or another. It would be really cool if the Swift compiler would build code…

I agree but

> I'm hopeful the Swift engineers also see value in that

I have a feeling it's not the engineers who would be to blame.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#82
post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Startups led by non-engineers just leave a bad taste in my mouth for some reason. This comment definitely evokes that feeling.

Erhm. Aral knows code. Trust me :) Also if you read a bit further, the effort on Phoenix is lead by Greg Casamento, who is also involved with GNUStep (and thus bringing the NS* objects to Linux).

Thanks for the clarification. I've met Aral and consider him a very smart guy, I was just commenting about my gut feeling in situations similar to this. I'm happy to learn I'm wrong in this case. :)

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#84
post #19

Aren't they probably just holding off on open sourcing it until...it's finished. I know they've just shipped '1.0' but I think they're still making pretty big changes.

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.…

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.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#85
post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The reason you are getting downvoted (I believe) is that you are posing a false dilemma.[1] It is not the case that Apple is most likely going to leave Swift closed source based on the evidence that we've seen. ALL the evidence we have, as far as swift goes, is that they haven't decided yet, according to Chris' email quote. As others have said, most of Apple's other programming language work has become open source, a…

> ALL the evidence we have, as far as swift goes, is that they haven't decided yet, according to Chris' email quote.

Yes, precisely. Apple currently has no intention of open-sourcing Swift. All of the evidence supports precisely what I've been saying. This is why I think it is good to remind them that we want them to decide in the affirmative.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#86
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.…

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.

Define the term "Android".

And in so doing you might discover the problem.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#87
post #71

"Guys, feel free to make up your own dragons if you want, but your speculation is just that: speculation. We literally have not even discussed this 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. You can imagine that many of us want it to be open source and part of ll…

I wonder if there is an intentional difference between "You can imagine that many of us want it to be open source" and "As you can imagine, many of us want it to be open source".

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#88
post #77
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. I never, ever said Swift was going to be open-sourced. My only point is that, despite whatever circumstantial evidence you've cited, Apple has not decided that they don't want Swift to be open sourced. > Also, he said they have stuff to do before the release thi…

Like so many people in this thread, you have taken what I said, which is quite simple, and twisted it into something bizarre. I'm simply saying that Apple has not expressed any intention to open-source Swift. Because of this, I think taking it for granted is overly optimistic.

I think we might be in violent agreement, and if I misread your intent I apologize. Nevertheless, whatever Apple's current stance on the matter is, I think we can both agree that they really, really should open-source Swift.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#89
They should definitely do this as they have in the past with Webkit, canvas, Khronos support of OpenGL ES (finally getting a focused product out of OpenGL ES/WebGL), and more.

They might just be taking a bit of an early adopter grab and will open it up later, hopefully. Metal is awesome as well but just when OpenGL really became the platform after mobile disrupted gaming.

Even if they don't open up Swift, maybe at least let Phoenix be like a Mono to their .NET and support it.

Taking a step back it is crazy how much Apple has influenced and taken over gaming focus in 6+ years. Not only do they control the market and hardware but naturally now the graphic and native software/platforms.

Re: Introducing Phoenix, Swift set free

#90
http://www.opensource.apple.com

Give it time, I think it will be open. It's just not 100% finished yet, despite what Apple says.

The Xcode 5.1 sources include clang, lldb etc. We just need to wait for Xcode 6 sources to be up, pretty sure it'll include Swift.

Also worthy of note is that most of these packages are under BSD/APSL license, which doesn't mandate Apple to release the sources at all (e.g. the OS X kernel xnu is fully open source). Yet they do it. Google's version of "open" Android development isn't any different, they develop in private and dump the code to AOSP only once a particular version is 'finished'.

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