[Live-demo] Re: gvsig packaging

[Hamish]

Jorge  wrote:
> > * No more using Sun JRE but OpenJDK 1.6

Cameron wrote:
> As far as I'm aware, all applications on OSGeo-Live use the
> Sun JRE and we have removed (or we should remove) OpenJDK in
> order to save space.

in the last release it was removed to save space. (? 75-100mb ?)

> Rather than switching to OpenJDK, can you just note in the
> status spreadsheet that your application can run with
> OpenJDK. Once all applications can use OpenJDK, we can then
> move all applications across.

IMO we should be gently nudging projects to work with the OpenJDK,
and as a standard testing platform which will end up in the hands
of the "right" developers are in a position to apply some light encouragement. :)  At the same time as long as everything's
legal to redistribute I'm not going to lecture folks and tell
them what to do on moral grounds. If they have their hearts and
time set on one bit of software or license that's their business.


Java has some serious Industry momentum which should stop Oracle
from doing anything too nuts with it, but the future is rather
uncertain, and as it is, our ability to redistribute is clinging
to a single exemption phrase in an additional clause, which I
don't feel comfortable personally endorsing without consulting a
lawyer. My concern is that with the stroke of a 3rd party's pen
we're going to be left in a situation where we can't distribute
JAI, or perhaps even the JVM, and all of our great GeoJava
packages which aren't fully OpenJDK compatible suddenly become
non-functional. I've got no idea if that will ever happen, but
if it did that would suck and so OpenJDK if nothing else is an
insurance policy. (plus the "right thing to do", if you are
motivated by the Libre side of things)


> > * Removed non-free libraries for ECW or MrSID loading

I'll admit to falling behind with their status: is it a situation
of license compatibility, patents in certain parts of the world,
or just "all downloads will come from the company" redistribution
type thing? are these the gdal plugins or java specific libraries?


Hamish