More tweaks to the repo - important for commercial apps

[milkshake]

Hi guys,


some new stuff added for commercial apps:


1) app owners can now give away free copys of their commerical software via the apps administration page (maybe for review or any other reason)- moderators cannot do this however so if there is an issue where you cant give your app away to someone myself or EvilDragon do have the ability to do this.


The app must be commercial for this option to be seen administration page.


-if an app is given away it cannot be taken back - its not a loan service


2) app owners can now choose if there app can be "gifted" or not, I know its unlikely that devs will want to disallow this but just in case the option is there.


(this was hacked together in a couple of hours, it works perfect but doesn't look beautiful or anything)


ok that is all.


actually in the next week or so I will add an option so the app dev can choose wether or not he wants to allow his apps to be redistributed or not (for example a repo MIRROR ) on an per app basis, I will add an extra item to the REPO json for this so that its clear to anyone wanting to mirror or redistribute files from the repo which apps to avoid hosting elsewhere, this should help the current debate ongoing on the boards at the moment.


-this was suggested by _wb_ on IRC.

 

[PokeParadox]

Thanks milkshake!

 

[_wb_]

I hope this will calm down things a bit and clear things up for all of us. To deal with the existing PNDs, I suggest putting everything in "non-redistributable", then grepping the license field for strings like "GPL" and "MIT" and putting those in "redistributable". The other ones will have to be sorted by the package maintainers themselves.

 

[pmprog]

Something that I stumbled on in the other thread. When ZXDunny removed his apps, you could still access the PNDs if you knew the URL. I'm wondering if that's something that should be looked at?


Good work

 

[mcobit]

Great! now we still need a filesection.


*whip*

 

[Rockthesmurf]

Wow, Milkshake that is great work, and extremely fast. I am still blown away with the fact we even have a nice repo like this for all the software, and having these cool features is ace!


Thanks for taking the time to code it all up.


Steve

 

[milkshake]

Something that I stumbled on in the other thread. When ZXDunny removed his apps, you could still access the PNDs if you knew the URL. I'm wondering if that's something that should be looked at?


Good work

Well actually this shouldnt happen as the download page checks to see if the app is disabled.


if its allowing DL's then there is something I need to fix.


EDIT


I checked the DL link http://repo.openpandora.org/includes/download.php?app=forgetmenot.zxdunny.2994


and it redirects you to the app details page which tells you the app is disabled, so it appears to still be working.

 

[milkshake]

Ok so I'm going to add this tick-able option for devs to decide whether they want their apps to be free for redistribution via a mirror or whatever but I am not sure what the default option should be...


either allow re-distribution by default and let the app dev disable this if he wants (but if his app is GPL or similar this can be ignored) or disallow by default and allow the dev to switch on if he wants, I think the first option but would like some feedback.


of course if I go with the former or latter I will send an email to all users of the repo about the change so allow them to switch the option on or off.

 

[PokeParadox]

Hmmm tough call. I reckon the BEST thing to do would be to let an uploader have a default setting for PNDs uploaded.


Definitely take into account the license included in the PND.


I'm thinking that defaulting to allow mirroring would be more convenient from an end-user PoV - But either or would be fine as long was we are aware what the default is.

 

[Binky]

Great! now we still need a filesection.


*whip*

How would you ensure that uploaded files are pandora-related?

 

[mcobit]

Great! now we still need a filesection.


*whip*

How would you ensure that uploaded files are pandora-related?

The same way it is done on the openhandhelds site. Require an useraccount and for dataarchives or files, have them reviewed by mods before they are published.


Should work imho.

 

[_wb_]

For NEW uploads I would make the default "redistributable" - it's fine to make this an opt-out thing since uploaders should read the fine print before pressing the submit button. For existing PNDs the default should be "non-redistributable" to be sure (since they did not agree to anything), but it should be possible to automatically make a significant fraction of them marked as "redistributable" without having to contact the maintainers by grepping for license strings like "GPL", "MIT", "Apache" etc.

 

[milkshake]

Ok the changes have gone live, app owners can now allow/disallow their application to be re distributable on a per app basis.


I have added a marker on the app details page for each application and also added a node to the REPO JSON for each package, this is not part of the official REPO spec but should work fine without breaking any apps using the JSON feed.

"redistributable":1,

so for anybody wanting to MIRROR coff "DREDD" please be nice and check this node of the JSON thanks

also please be nice and keep the mirrors up to date in regards to versions to stop outdated bug reports etc.



I have sent the following email to all vendors of the repo:

Hi <insert username here>,


I have added an option to the repo by which you can decide on a per app basis.

if you would like to allow your app to be redistributable via a MIRROR or other method.


You can do this by visiting your applications administration page and selecting the appropriate option.


By default the option is pre-set to allow your applications to be redistributable


unless it is a commercial application in which case its pre-set to disallow redistribution.


Please bare in mind that if your application is under the GPL or similar software license the redistribution notice can be ignored.


If you have any questions about this please direct them to the following topic on the offical open pandora forum:

http://boards.openpandora.org/index.php?/topic/9843-more-tweaks-to-the-repo-important-for-commercial-apps/


Kind Regards

milkshake

if you think I should make existing PND's non re distributable by default I can do that.

 

[_wb_]

With this email message I suppose it is OK: it's reasonable enough to assume redistribution will be allowed (after all they did already allow the repo to distribute it in the first place), and I suspect at least 95% of the repo contents is either GPL or similar, public domain, or freeware that allows redistribution.

 

[Rockthesmurf]

@Milkshake: I think you have made the right decisions. My impression is there is only a very small minority of users that wish to block the redistribution of the software hosted on repo.openpandora.org so your defaults are sensible. Also, there are currently only a very small number of commercial titles on the repository, and taking the cautious option of disallowing redistribution by default both makes sense but also means any disruption will affect at most one or two users who have to go in and change the tick box.


@_wb_: I think you are also right in that expecting users to 'read the fine print' is not unreasonable.


Interestingly enough, I removed the gift option from KAMI RETRO, and informed DREDD about this, and asked whether he will cease to redistribute KAMI RETRO, however I have as of yet received no response, and his page, http://blah.pandoria.org/ppp/ still appears to offer the title. But lets not get this thread off track, I'll wait some more time as it is reasonable that DREDD maybe away for a day or two (although it does highlight an issue when people start offering 'services' for commercial applications and then aren't available around the clock when licensing/prices/terms change).


Steve

 

[pmprog]

Maybe remove commercial titles from the JSON list. Should any of the repo clients (PNDManager) get around to supporting the commercial stuff (I may incorrectly be assuming that they currently don't), they could be given a different process?

 

[mcobit]

Maybe remove commercial titles from the JSON list. Should any of the repo clients (PNDManager) get around to supporting the commercial stuff (I may incorrectly be assuming that they currently don't), they could be given a different process?

That wouldn't be good, as you can still download already purchased apps with pndmanager, if you have your repokey in it.

 

[pmprog]

That wouldn't be good, as you can still download already purchased apps with pndmanager, if you have your repokey in it.

I didn't know that.


Maybe if the JSON is generated at runtime, the repokey could be sent and affect what is returned?