Chris Cason wrote:
> So, this post is on behalf of the project: developers are welcome

And this post is on behalf of myself:

I accept that not releasing the source earlier was unwise. It wasn't a
conscious decision per se (time just got away from me), but either way the
fault rests with me and I apologise to those who wished for earlier access.

I am seriously considering opening our revision control system for public
read access. The main issue stopping me is that I don't want to revisit the
same sort of issues that people flame us for already: they don't like our
type of 'free'. We use Perforce for revision control, which has free (as in
no cost to use) client software*, but is not Free Software such as SVN is.
I don't expect a requirement to have to install non "Free Software" to
access the repo would be very popular, and frankly I don't want to have to
deal with the inevitable complaints (as Linus's experience with a
proprietary SCCS showed).

While I could migrate to SVN (there is a p42svn tool), I'd prefer to wait
until 3.7 is finished if this is to be done (note I use SVN daily at work
and am in a good position to compare the two - I find I prefer Perforce).

I am looking into the logistics of providing a parallel svn repo that is
automatically kept up to date with the perforce one via nightly runs of
p42svn or some other similar system. I don't think this would be difficult.
Or if there was really enough interest from potential developers to make it
worthwhile, I would bite the bullet and change the project over to SVN
immediately - but given the content of this thread I am certainly not
holding my breath regarding the latter.

-- Chris


* The server normally costs money (if you want more than two users) but
  Perforce has kindly provided us with a free-of-cost license for most of
  the past decade under their policy of supporting open source projects.

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