FOSS gamedev and creative worlds

Is there any body could port minetest to iOS for me?

i would give you $1000 as salary,if you are interested ,please email me af261014@gmail.com

The main principle of Minetest (and most of free software) is that it's completely disinterested. Proposing a lucrative job for Minetest is simply violating our principles.
That's very strange, I know, on this world on which everything is bought, but here proposing $1000 is only making people ignoring your request!
Porting Minetest to iOS may be discussed (but I have very little hope on it), provided it's for free.

And I seriously doubt whether you would really give $1000 just for getting an iOS Minetest.

Gael de Sailly wrote:The main principle of Minetest (and most of free software) is that it's completely disinterested. Proposing a lucrative job for Minetest is simply violating our principles.

Uh, that is not quite correct for FLOSS in general. Pretty much every FLOSS license allows you to sell the software and/or services around them (support, build, etc.). There are more than enough projects which accept donations or have bounties on bugs and features, there are a lot FLOSS projects which make money in one way or another (selling support, selling build services, consulting, or paid development to get a feature or bug fixed).

Now, I can't speak for the whole Minetest community, but last time Kenny but out some bounties people seemed quite positive about it.

That may be legal, but that's not morally correct (in my opinion).

I dislike the GNU licenses for this very reason, they are rather complicated in the name of "freedom", even though they are rather restrictive.

Can we please stay on topic?

I don't think we need to discuss if one thinks it is immoral. There is no restriction in the license that inhibits a port. And this is also a method used to develop features for LibreOffice.

If chen261014 wants to spent 1000$ on an iOS port for MT then then let him/her. Although he/she should be aware that there is no legal way to distribute LGPL licensed code (like Minetest) via their public app store. http://stackoverflow.com/a/9070734

benrob0329 wrote:I dislike the GNU licenses for this very reason, they are rather complicated in the name of "freedom", even though they are rather restrictive.

Well, they are about *preserving* freedom, not granting absolute freedom. The BSD likes on the other side are about granting absolute freedom, without preserving it (good example is the Playstation, they are running on BSD kernels, and as far as I know not a single contribution has found its way back to the BSD projects).

Unfortunately there can be no middle ground to this.

Lock this thread, or maybe even delete it. We don't need bounty hunters in the community.

There is no basis in locking this thread. I'm considering offering bounties for certain features I'd like to see but don't have the time or the skills to implement. I see it as buying the contributor a coffee and cake or two in return for their help. Just because Minetest is available for gratis doesn't mean the all contributors must work for gratis. Minetest is about freedom, not necessarily gratis.

The best FOSS software is written by paid employes. Linux, Android (although not entirely FOSS), and VirtualBox iirc.

Gael de Sailly wrote:That may be legal, but that's not morally correct (in my opinion).

I'd argue that it's more morally wrong to demand

Gael de Sailly wrote:Proposing a lucrative job for Minetest is simply violating our principles.

I disagree with this. Violating our principles would be attempting to make it closed source. Offering a reward for help isn't a violation imo.

Saying that, $1000 is a very unrealistic bountry. Especially given that you wouldn't make much money out of an iOS port, unless it's put illegally on the app store.

lisacvuk wrote:We don't need bounty hunters in the community.

Why not? Wouldn't it be nice to have more skilled developers working on the project? Just because they make something doesn't mean that it will be accepted and merged, if it is of low quality. And if it's of good quality, then good.

Rewarding publicly with money on such a place might introduce jealousy, unhealthy avidity and individualism — this isn't the Wild West. But I guess it depends of cultures, some are more rightist / liberal and find that normal.

rubenwardy wrote:

Gael de Sailly wrote:Proposing a lucrative job for Minetest is simply violating our principles.

I disagree with this. Violating our principles would be attempting to make it closed source. Offering a reward for help isn't a violation imo.

I agree with you. Open source/free-as-in-freedom is not mutually exclusive with commercial, per se. As an example, ASEprite charges $10 for the binaries and guarantees free updates up to version 1.9 (you also have a free demo version with some features disabled). But even then, you are free to take the source code (it's GPL'd, free as in freedom) and build it yourself. Seems like a reasonable model in my opinion.

That said, this "bounty" looks like the usual "help me build a custom version I can sell in $MARKETPLACE [and don't give source to anyone]". Would like to see a clarification from the OP regarding this.

Xcode is now open source. This means that anyone can build Minetest for iOS, in accordance with the LGPL.
This is true?

Not really, the GNU licenses are anti DRM (a reason not to use them) so you can't post it on a DRM based store.

benrob0329 wrote:Not really, the GNU licenses are anti DRM (a reason not to use them) so you can't post it on a DRM based store.

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/7905 ... -licensing
"Unlike GPL version 3, which prohibits using the code if you are implementing copy protection or DRM software, you can use LGPL version 3 licensed code in an application which includes copy protection or DRM."

https://lwn.net/Articles/526355/

Ah, I did not know that, thanks!

I will make more interesting.
If we can have official Minetest in App Store, i paid $ 5,000 to the person who will make a quality port!
And if you do not want money, I will sacrifice them wherever you want (animal welfare, aid to refugees etc.) and send you a confirmation.

hmmm i would be willing to port minetest to iOS (if i ever get an iphone) and for free XD. and i was wondering if it would be possible to use some sort of launcher for minetest on iOS that way the launcher could be licenced under some proprietary license just so it could be put on the app store. and the launcher would download minetest which is obviously open source software (please excuse my bad grammar)

stormchaser3000 wrote:hmmm i would be willing to port minetest to iOS (if i ever get an iphone) and for free XD. and i was wondering if it would be possible to use some sort of launcher for minetest on iOS that way the launcher could be licenced under some proprietary license just so it could be put on the app store. and the launcher would download minetest which is obviously open source software (please excuse my bad grammar)

I'm sure that Apple does not allow it to add the App Store.

Martin_Devil wrote:

stormchaser3000 wrote:hmmm i would be willing to port minetest to iOS (if i ever get an iphone) and for free XD. and i was wondering if it would be possible to use some sort of launcher for minetest on iOS that way the launcher could be licenced under some proprietary license just so it could be put on the app store. and the launcher would download minetest which is obviously open source software (please excuse my bad grammar)

I'm sure that Apple does not allow it to add the App Store.

that is why i said a proprietary license for the launcher (the thing i would add to the store) if only apple wasn't so incredibly restrictive as to how you can download applications on ios.

If the app store is anything like Google play, it won't allow you to do that.

Note the the app store doesn't disallow free and open source software, it's just that the gpl license isn't compatible.

rubenwardy wrote:If the app store is anything like Google play, it won't allow you to do that.

Note the the app store doesn't disallow free and open source software, it's just that the gpl license isn't compatible.

Do not confuse the GPL and LGPL. GPL does not fully compatible, but LGPL partially compatible. But, unfortunately, I can not find an exact answer.

The MPL and CDDL seem like good in between licenses.

Is there any package format for iOS? If not, then we shouldn't even support it.

lisacvuk wrote:Is there any package format for iOS? If not, then we shouldn't even support it.

there isn't from what i know (except possibly some unofficial ones that require a jailbreak)

stormchaser3000 wrote:hmmm i would be willing to port minetest to iOS (if i ever get an iphone) and for free XD. and i was wondering if it would be possible to use some sort of launcher for minetest on iOS that way the launcher could be licenced under some proprietary license just so it could be put on the app store. and the launcher would download minetest which is obviously open source software (please excuse my bad grammar)

You could even distribute minetest with the launcher as long as the user can replace the version of minetest you ship with a different one. Of course Apple might not like that because it allows arbitrary code to be executed.