April 27, 2005

Things like Rails

I posted way back when about Ruby on Rails a framework that a like for a programming language I don't know. Since I found out about it, I've been wanting to find something similar in the language I do know: PHP.

Today (since some time has passed since my last search), I found a few:

  1. Cake PHP framework
  2. Jaws

Right now (without looking at the code or even trying the frameworks), Cake looks the most promising as it's under the Public Domain license (which I need to read). Jaws is under the GPL which means anything built on it will in turn also be under the GPL. Now, if they were to add and "L" to the front of their license accronym, it'd be a different story.

Anyway, I hope to dig through these and post more.

Update: I contact the Jaws developers today and the license has been happily changed from GPL to the LGPL.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 05:05 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 22, 2005

Open Source Licensing considerations

I've been pondering open source licensing for a while. I use a lot of open source software at my little company, but we typically avoid the licensing issue by only charging for services like custom development, hosting, and setup.

But what if I ever wanted to go beyond that? What if I wanted to support an open source project by contributing code and possibly donations, but I wanted to sell my derivitave work without giving away all my "trade secrets" via the GPL?

It seems other people are pondering this. In my recent "gpl business" searching on Google, I cam across this article: Open Source Licensing: Rosen Claims GPL Would Never Stand Up in Court @ LBN. It seems I'm not the only one pondering this.

Other things that have brought these thoughts to a head are dotProject's move from the BSD (a very business friendly license) in 1.0.2 to the GPL as of 2.0. And just before that, I found that the Etomite CMS has been dropped by the core developer because of the GPL (and a thousand different misunderstandings thereof).

In the article I mentioned earlier, the Open Source Initiative (rather Rosen, the former general counsel of it) has questioned the viability of the GPL to stand up in court.

What it all comes down to is that there needs to be a license that is friendly both to hobbiest developers and business developers. The LGPL, the GPL's little brother, handles this pretty well by making it focused on just the library or component. In the end the LGPL takes away the mercenary nature of the GPL by not making the whole project be forced to use its license. The library itself will be rulled by GPL rules, but not the whole project.

In my mind that promotes colaboration on underlying components (typically the hard part) and leaves actual creation of products to companies who can sell their product, and hobbiests who just want a free alternative.

The GPL seems to make everyone give up their code, which in my mind completely negates the purpose of putting a little (c) on anything you create.

Just thoughts.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 09:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 21, 2005

FacileForms for Mambo 4.5.1+

FacileForms is a handy little form generation component for the Mambo CMS. I've just started using it on some projects and found it's pretty nice to use. It does have a bit of a learning curve. Once you learn the basics, though, it's a great tool to get you quick forms without the backend coding.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 08:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Where is wisdom?

Job 28:12
“But where shall wisdom be found?
And where is the place of understanding?"

Job 28:23
“God understands the way to it,
and he knows its place."

Job 28:28
"And he said to man,
‘Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom,
and to turn away from evil is understanding.’”

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 06:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 13, 2005

My Redeemer Lives

"For I know that my Redeemer lives,
and at the last he will stand upon the earth."
Job 19:25

Though I feel distant from God, there will be a judgement day when I will stand in my flesh before God. My Redeemer lives. He will have to buy me back, because I cannot stand the wrath or avoid it on my own.

Jesus Christ save me from the wrath to come.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 06:20 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

April 11, 2005

IE: Tired of waiting

Found this work around package for IE that should make IE do the things the best browsers have been doing for years: /IE7/.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 09:10 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 08, 2005

WiFi Philly

Special thanks to Brannon for pointing this out.

Philadelphia to Get First Citywide Wi-Fi Network

Maybe Greer will be next. :)

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 07:38 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

April 05, 2005

Scrub this on your Web App!

Ajax by Jesse James Garrett.

Another things to note (sadly it lacks a cleaner name): JPSpan. A tool to use to implement the Ajax concept with PHP and JavaScript. Part of the process mind you.

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 04:07 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

April 01, 2005

Would that there were...

"Would that there were an arbiter between us,
who might lay his hand on us both." - Job 9:33 (ESV)

Posted by TheIdeaMan at 06:27 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack