Re: [boost] Re: Who's Using Boost?

From: Maciej Sobczak (prog_at_[hidden])
Date: 2005-06-06 10:06:41

Tobias Schwinger wrote:

> GREPping over the Gentoo Linux [ http://www.gentoo.org ] - Ebuilds tells 
> me that the following projects have boost among their dependecies:

Which raises an interesting point.

The Boost licence was carefully worded in a way that does not require 
the dependent software to admit it. In other words, I can write a 
software that uses Boost and I don't have to give any credits to the 
Boost community when advertising my product. Some vendors of proprietary 
and closed software (and maybe others as well) can see this as a feature 
of the Boost licensing scheme.

Some might even use Boost and *hide* this fact from their customers [1]. 
It is still fine from the licence point of view.

Now - is it OK to publicly list projects as "proud" users of Boost, 
without asking them first whether they want to announce this?

;-)

Of course, with open source projects it is not a problem - everybody can 
check (that's the point of open source). But be careful with other projects.

[1] Yes, I've met people who hate Boost. They are incompetent and are 
not able to justify their biases, but they have a power to take decisions.

-- 
Maciej Sobczak
http://www.msobczak.com