Bryce Harrington wrote:
The key question for us is how we want to relate to Xara when the code is released. Would it make sense for us to share code with Xara? Should we merge, or remain distinct? They'd be open to sharing svn repositories if we'd like (I mentioned we've been looking to upgrade from cvs, and they already use svn)?
Very interesting.
Well, I'd say that we could steal code from them, but it is unlikely that they'd want ours -- for the simple reason that it seems they need copyright assignment.
From the FAQ:
Do you intend to sell commercial licenses?
Yes. Both on an OEM bases (anyone wanting to incorporate the product or any of our technology in closed source applications) and to end-users, individuals or corporate users who want Xara supported versions or versions that include licensed plug-ins or components (such as Pantone colour support this is a third party licensed product that we can't Open Source)
While I don't think most Inkscape developers are interesting in assigning copyright to Xara, I don't think even most current developers could claim copyright to large sections on Inkscape. I wouldn't even want to try and figure out all the copyright issues in Inkscape.
That being said, I have no problem working with the folks from Xara, I think it's pretty cool what they're doing. But, I think as long as they want to dual-license, there is not much code they can get from us. Of course, I'm willing to pillage their codebase ;)
--Ted