Blackmoor Vituperative

I’ve received a response from the people at Code Monkey Publishing with regard to their nonstandard data sets. I asked why the CMP data sets were incompatible with every other available data set, and if there was a way to make them compatible. In short:

… yes, that is exactly the case, and is done intentionally. …

I’m sorry if that’s not the answer you wanted to hear, I’m sorry if you don’t like that answer, but that’s the answer.

(from W. Robert Reed III, aka “Mynex “, co-owner of Code Monkey Publishing)

So the bottom line is that the Code Monkey Publishing data sets do not work correctly with PCGen, and they aren’t going to. So I’ve wasted my money. More importantly, I’ve wasted my time. Furthermore, if I want to use PCGen to create characters using feats and spells that aren’t part of the OGL, I’ll have to code them by hand, even though I paid CMP so that I wouldn’t have to do that. I don’t like that answer, but that’s the answer.

Do not waste your money or your time on data sets from Code Monkey Publishing.

News from the Free Software Foundation is that the next version of the GPL may include penalties against those who patent software or use DRM in their products.

Specifically, the new GNU GPL (General Public License) may contain a patent retaliation clause. …

Other open-source licenses already do, noted Larry Rosen, founding partner of a partner in the law firm Rosenlaw & Einschlag and author of “Open-Source Licensing: Software Freedom and Intellectual Property Law.”

“I’m pleased that FSF is going to add patent defense to its new GPL 3. Many other open-source licenses have such provisions already,” said Rosen.

(from eWeek, New GPL Will Contain Patent Protection

I’m not sure adding penalties will actually accompish anything, though. If anything, I think they might chill the widespread adoption of open source software. Which is a shame, because, in principle, I think they’re a great idea: as Greve said, software patents and DRM are a menace to society.

I recently returned to D&D, and thus to PCGen, after a hiatus of a couple of years. PCGen 5.8.0 is out, and it is a good improvement over previous versions. I recommend it. However, I do not recommend that anyone buy the “official” core rules and “complete” series of data sets from Code Monkey Publishing (aka “CMP”). Not only are they a pain in the ass to install (it took me a half-dozen tries), they make every other PCGen data set completely inaccessible.

It burns me up, because I actually paid for these (while PCGen itself, which works just fine, is free).

I am looking into a way to make these Code Monkey data sets interoperable with the rest of PCGen. It may not even be possible, in which case I’ll be deleting them and PCGen, and re-installing PCGen fresh, without the incompatible Code Monkey Publishing data sets. If I do find a way to make the CMP data sets work with the rest of PCGen, I’ll let you know.

Until then, I urge you in the strongest possible terms not to buy any data sets from Code Monkey Publishing.

All OpenOffice.org source code and binaries (executable files) up to and including OpenOffice.org 2 Beta 2 are licensed under both the LGPL and SISSL. Effective 2 September 2005, all code in the 2.0 codeline will be licensed exclusively under the LGPL. All future versions of OpenOffice.org, beyond OpenOffice.org 2 Beta 2, will thus be released under the LGPL only. The change in licensing implicitly affects all languages and platforms in which OpenOffice.org is distributed.

(from OpenOffice.org, License Simplification FAQ)

This goes along with the OSI initiative to trim the ridiculous number of OSI-approved open source licenses down from 50 or so to around 3, which I wrote about back in February. At this rate, it’ll be the year 2026 before they reach their goal. Still, kudos to Sun for taking that scary step of altering their license.

I updated the site statistics. More hackers whose IPs have been logged and blocked, and more weird search terms which led people here. It seems that the Fantanas are more popular than Windows. Who’d have guessed?

I have learned several things from Hurricane Katrina:

1. When the government announces a mandatory evacuation, get the hell out of Dodge.
2. The federal government is just as incompetent at responding to a crisis as it is at everything else.
3. The National Guard should never leave American soil. They should be here to defend, protect, and serve Americans, not killing and getting killed by people halfway around the world so that we can save a few cents on a barrel on oil. (That’s what the Army and Marines are for.)
4. People are really, really stupid. Rather than learning anything useful from the Federal response to Katrina (see #2, for example), they seize on ridiculous conspiracy theories. I’d believe that the heads of FEMA and the Department Of Homeland Security were robots wearing humans skins before I’d give credence to the theory that the hurricane response was so embarassingly awful because most of the victims were black. Of course, the people who spout this nonsense are the same people who believe:
   1. that “global warming” exists,
   2. that it caused Hurricane Katrina,
   3. that human action is to blame for it,
   4. that we have to Do Something about it, and
   5. that we can Do Something about it.
5. Law-abiding people should always have a supply of weapons and ammuntion in watertight containers. Why? Looters.

Donate to the Hurricane Katrina relief effort.

In a spectacular demonstration of amazingly good sense, the commonwealth of Massachusetts has proposed a plan to phase out office productivity applications from Microsoft and other providers in favor of those based on “open” standards, including the recently approved OpenDocument standard.

The state’s move is a boost to the relatively new standard, whose full name is the OASIS Open Document Format for Office Applications. It’s also a blow to Microsoft, which dominates the office application market and has found government customers to be among those most aggressively considering open-source alternatives.

The OpenDocument format, which was ratified as a standard in May, covers office applications, including word processors, spreadsheets and charts.

It is the default format for the OpenOffice open-source suite of applications and is supported in suites by Novell and Sun Microsystems and by IBM in its Workplace products.

(from ZDNet, Massachusetts to adopt ‘open’ desktop)

Microsoft responded with the usual FUD, of course:

Alan Yates, Microsoft’s general manager of Information Worker business strategy, criticized the Massachusetts proposal, saying it was “confusing”. …

Yates reiterated the Microsoft does not intend to natively support the OpenDocument format, which he said was very specific to the OpenOffice 2.0 open-source suite.

He said Microsoft can provide the same data interoperability and archiving that Massachusetts is pursuing because Microsoft publishes the XML schema of its Office applications and makes available through a royalty free license.

(from ZDNet, Massachusetts to adopt ‘open’ desktop)

This is terrific news, I heartily commend the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and I hope that Virginia follows their lead. It kind of reminds me of that poster with the little white mouse and the hawk, though. You know the one: the hawk is swooping down, and the mouse is about to be caught and eaten, but the mouse is giving the hawk the finger. At the top of the poster is the word “DEFIANCE”.

Hey Fantasmo fans!

Due to a number of scheduling issues, Fantasmo will be held on a special night in September. This time around we will be unleashing our films on Saturday, 2005-09-24, 19:30 (at Chesapeake Central Library, as always). As a special treat to get you in the mood for Halloween and Monsterfest, Team Fantasmo is proud to bring you the sequels to both Count Yorga Vampire and Blacula (screened at Fantasmo Episode 2). If you loved the first ones (and we know you did), the sequels are even better!

Scheduled Films:

19:30 – The Return of Count Yorga (1971) – Robert Quarry turns in another terrific performance as the pompous count, this time stalking prey at a neighboring orphanage. Only his Van-Helsingesque nemesis (again played by Roger Perry) stands in his way. This time the suspense and horror are doubled (and noticeably so is the budget)! Rated PG.

21:15 – Scream Blacula Scream (1973) – William Marshall reprises his signature role as the African prince made into a vampire by none other than Dracula himself. When a voodoo priest makes the unfortunate mistake of resurrecting Blacula, havoc ensues on the L.A. streets. This time around, Marshall is joined on screen by 70’s icon Pam Grier (Quentin Tarantino’s Jackie Brown) as a voodoo priestess who tries to help him lift his curse. Featuring top-notch performances, another great soundtrack, and non-stop action, you can’t afford to miss this one! Rated PG.

For more info, call (757) 382-6591 or check out the web site at www.chesapeake.lib.va.us.

Be sure not to miss these masterworks on the big screen — the way they were meant to be seen!

Coming Saturday October 8 – Fantasmo Episode 7: Monsterfest Edition

Here’s a thought for today:

Historically, “who is right?” is usually a rhetorcial question. What matters is who has the power to impose their opinion on others. Being right doesn’t deflect bullets, defend your property, keep your family safe from thieves and cutthroats, or ensure that you can speak your mind and worship or not as you see fit. The people who wrote the Bill Of Rights understood this. It seems that not many people today do.

It does not matter if you are right or wrong, if you can’t prevent people from imposing their opinions on you. For most of human history, it wasn’t even a question worth asking: might made right.

As Ash once said, “Good… bad… I’m the guy with the gun.”

John Carroll over at ZDNet has an article about what it would take for Linux and open source software can compete with the Microsoft “ecosystem”. His first two points are pretty reasonable. In fact, I think they’re common wisdom by now:

1. More consistency: Ecosystems are essentially standards that extend across software markets. They simplify development by lowering costs, shortening development timeframes and leveraging knowledge across markets.

For Linux to build a proper ecosystem, more thought needs to be applied to what technology will be present on every instance of Linux. That’s going to be hard, as one of the things that appeals to so many users of Linux is its technology agnosticism. … For instance, choose whether every system must include KDE or Gnome (but not both). Decide that every instance of Linux must ship with Corba, and which Corba ORB it should use. Every version of Linux should ship with Java or .NET….

2. Greater spread: I noted in my original post that ecosystems are only as valuable as their spread. That means that Linux cannot confine itself to markets where it is currently popular. Linux needs to spread, and that means they need to get more popular in desktops, handhelds, cell phones, music players, media technology, etc.

No stunning news there.

From here, however, Carroll veers into the Twilight Zone:

3. Detente with the world of proprietary software: Now for the controversial stuff. The single biggest force holding back the growth of open source software are the Free Software vigilantes who view proprietary software as tantamount to slavery. That puts open source in the productive category of nations that prevent the female half of the population from working. Open source programmers do great things, but proprietary software can benefit from both the efforts of open source programmers AND the efforts of those who create for financial gain.

That’s a waste. Philosophically, open source should move closer to Eric Raymond (who understands that there is a role for proprietary software) and away from Richard Stallman (who is on record as saying programmer’s should make less money).

Yes, Stallman is a flake. You’ll get no argument from me there. And no, he obviously shouldn’t be setting policy for the open source movement. He had a great idea, and he’s due credit for that, but just because the gods reach down and touch a band and they have one of the best songs ever (e.g., How Soon Is Now by The Smiths) doesn’t mean that you should listen to that band for the rest of your life.

But Carroll is missing the central element of what makes open source software “open source” — the license requires it. You can’t combine GPL and patented software into one product. The GPL is sometimes compared to a virus. It’s not: patents are the virus, and the GPL is the cure. Compromising with the world of proprietary, patented software would destroy the world of open source software.

4. Encourage a paying market atop your products: … Of course, there is nothing which officially stops companies from selling Linux software. There is a barrier, however, that derives from a culture that expects low-cost, if not free, open source products.

This is partly derived from the difficulties of deriving revenue from software as such when the secret sauce is published for all the world to see. Lots of people gloss over that problem by noting that there are lots of other ways to make money from software besides sales. Even so, it’s worth noting that the web of companies that build software for Windows (and who form a large part of the appeal of Microsoft’s platforms) are attracted by the profits to be generated by a pool of buyers with a demonstrated willingness to pay.

A similar buying culture needs to be built for the open source world. That will require, of course, jettisoning the “free software” philosophy which drove the movement in its early days.

So in order for open source software to compete with the Microsoft hegemony, it needs to stop being open source. Thank you for that pearl of wisdom, Mr. Quisling.

Here is a man who physically embodies the concept of “not getting it”.