Playing with Django
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Snaking.
Decided I needed to play with Django so that I can at least know what it is.
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Mike C. Fletcher, the VRPlumber, is a philosopher of design turned computer programmer based in Toronto, Canada. He works primarily in the Python programming language, and maintains a large number of Open Source software packages. You can reach him at: mcfletch@vrplumber.com.
Federico Di Gregorio on 09/05/2005 6:07 a.m. #
Psycopg (2) does not force anything to be GPL, apart from PostgreSQL drivers derived from it. Next release (2.0rc1) will contain a clarification about licensing, GPL and exceptions to it. The clarification is already available from SVN trunk. Have fun. --fog
x on 09/08/2005 2:01 a.m. #
So I finally took a bit of a look at Django after you mentioning it again at our meeting yesterday. (Actually i started going through documentation and tutorial, and svn checkout, a bit during the meeting. (-;) ... <br />
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I have not looked into it as far as you seem to have in in this short post. I didn't actually try to do anything with it. But my reaction was.... "you've got to be kidding"... this is the latest and greatest framework that everyone is so excited about? Honestly, I tried to be open to being enlightened to new and better ways of doing things... but it just didn't happen.<br />
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No offense, but there's really not much there. There are a few "neat" elements; but not all that ultimately useful in my opinion. Maybe for some specific sorts of simple applications... but not much more.<br />
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The ORM was initially cute, but the more i looked at it the more suddenly SQLObject seemed reasonable to me. I have always found SQLObject's approach to ORM painfully kludgey and inflexible at points... but hmmm. Well, now I see... the design could be worse. (-;<br />
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I can see the attraction though. The attraction is the same as for PHP... the promise of hand holding (auto-generated code structure, in this case; and the 'admin interface') and extremely low barrier to entry with database capabilities. In short... it's an interesting toy. Maybe useful for certain types of generic apps. And quite possibly a lot of people will indeed use it. Like, much to my annoyance, the use PHP. (I've been fiddling with "Gallery" recently... PHP... once again just astonished at how horrible PHP code is... and the hoops people jump through to implement systems with it... i can only assume because of its low barrier to entry... gets them in... over their heads.) <br />
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I'm probably not going to make any friends with this post. Ah well, must remember, this is the world in which perl still manages to exist... <br />
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But speaking of friends... great to see Federico Di Gregorio's post above! I remember arguing with him on this issue in his mailing list several years ago... he said essentially the same thing then as now. Problem is that a lot of people seem to disagree with his interpretation, sadly. Hopefully his more recent clarifications in version 2 will be helpful in that regards.<br />
j on 10/27/2005 5:15 p.m. #
Our corporate counsel (probably the only real lawyer that has actually reviewed this) disagrees with Federico's questionable modifications to the GPL2. Specifically, he points out that the exemption made in psycopg2's license (http://initd.org/tracker/psycopg/browser/psycopg2/trunk/LICENSE) only addresses clause 2c of the GPL2, and doesn't cover any of the other specific legal restrictions covering derived works:<br />
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A. refers to any such program or work, and a "work based on the Program"<br />
means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law: that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another language. <br />
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B. Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program.<br />
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C. 2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:<br />
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a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.<br />
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b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.<br />
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D. These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those<br />
sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.<br />
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E. 4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License. However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance.<br />
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F. This General Public License does not permit incorporating your program into proprietary programs. If your program is a subroutine library, you may consider it more useful to permit linking proprietary applications with the library. If this is what you want to do, use the GNU Library General Public License instead of this License.<br />
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Basically, the "new" psycopg2 license is just as misleading. If his goal were really to prevent unpublished modifications to the module itself, the LGPL would suffice (as it does for most other free software libraries). As it stands, the current license benefits Federico only, as people believe they can freely contribute to and use this software without relicensing their own -- this simply is not the case, under US copyright law (all Python code which imports or ships with psycopg needs to be relicensed).<br />
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Don't take my word for it - ask your own IP lawyer, or licensing@gnu.org for clarification. Django (and any project that uses it with psycopg) needs to be not only GPL2, but GPL2+Federico's changes, to be compliant...