What is ratDVD?

Dialhot · #1 06-23-2005, 06:20 PM

Hi all,

A question on a french forum lighted something in my mind.
What do we know about ratDVD ?

The website is opened since only a month. But let's be honnest : such a tool can't have been designed in less than 6 monthes, probably more. Moreover when the author always talk as 'I', never 'we'.

Second : the closed sources. I can hardly imagine
to developp such app as freeware and not sharing the source, even to receive some help to enhance ? What is really in the source ? Who can tell the .ratDVD is not tagged somehow to identify the original releaser of a file ?

Third : read carefully the website. Nothing is said about the author. Who he is, how can he be contacted (I know he goes on some forum but that's few).

Finally : a 1-month old website registered to a Danish citizen, a tool that is almost bug-free and... so much merchandising ? (mug, teeshirts, mousepad...).

I wonder : what the hell is that ?

Just a nighty thought...

Zyphon · #2 06-23-2005, 06:32 PM

Hi Phil, those are all excellent points you have made here and to be honest I haven't thougt about it until you brought this to light.

To be honest I haven't installed RatDVD as of yet and now that you have mentioned these concerns I don't think I will, like you said website over a month and a relatively new tool and bug free is pretty rare, most tools have glitches in them when released hence constant updates.

Unless it has been developed for months by a team who tested it rigorously tested it and he wants to keep the rest of his team quiet.

Mind you not having a contact e-mail addy not even a hotmail one is a bit suss.

It certainly does make you wonder if these files are tagged. I wonder if we will ever know the truth.

Prodater64 · #3 07-27-2005, 07:17 PM

I found this in D9: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=97893

Quote:

Hi,

we, the matroska team, have patiently been waiting that the full sourcecode of the menue navigation filter would be released, in order to fulfil the GPL license of the libdvdnav library which has been used for it. We frankly admit that we would like to use the code as an inspiration for our own menue filter, in order to make MKV file playback with menues possible on DirectShow players like WMP.

We understand from looking at oyur code that you have wrapped the libdvdnav lib into a COM object, and that you are linking to it from your navigation filter. However, please allow us to tell you that this is most definitely NOT in compliance with the GPL license of libdvdnav :
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq...rolledInterface
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html

Doing what you did is NOT enough to fulfil the GPL license, and we are urging you to release the FULL SOURCECODE of your filter to the OSS world within the next 2 weeks.

matroska is an opensource project itself, and we are releasing all project code under a L-GPL or even BSD license, to allow people to use our format free of cost or obligation. Your strange behaviour about wrapping your filter around a libdvdnav with a COM interface can do nothing else but make us believe you have different intentions with your program than actually serving the users.

Christian
matroska project admin
http://www.matroska.org

kwag · #4 07-27-2005, 10:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Prodater64

I found this in D9: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=97893

Quote:

Your strange behaviour about wrapping your filter around a libdvdnav with a COM interface can do nothing else but make us believe you have different intentions with your program than actually serving the users.

Christian
matroska project admin
http://www.matroska.org

Probably to protect their propietary code, similar to what Muaddib tried with Moviestacker.
It's really a shame the way the GPL works, but what else can you expect from Stallman

I found a quote on a site, which made me laugh, but it's very true

It was related to something like "If I was a manufacturer of GPL tires, and people buy tires from me, then I would be entitled to all manufacturing plans of all the cars who use my tires"

Seriously

, that's the GPL "way" applied to software

I'm just glad my opinion about GPL is equally shared by serious people in the industry. ( Guido Van Rossum, Eric Raymond, etc, etc, etc. )

-kwag

Zyphon · #5 07-28-2005, 03:06 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kwag

I found a quote on a site, which made me laugh, but it's very true

It was related to something like "If I was a manufacturer of GPL tires, and people buy tires from me, then I would be entitled to all manufacturing plans of all the cars who use my tires"

I love this quote.

It explains perfectly how ridiculous the GPL license is!.

It is such a restrictive license and good programs like Muaddib excellent MovieStacker now lies in a graveyard probably never to be seen again.

I also read that post over at D9 and imho the GPL should be avoided if possible when coding even though sometimes that is hard especially if your code calls externally programs that are under the GPL.

rds_correia · #6 07-29-2005, 01:44 PM

I found this: http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.ph...805#post691805
But it is surprisingly curious to see that D9 himself usually fails to find any GPL violations

That is, appart from Muaddib's violation, on the FitCD vs Moviestacker issue.
That one he could see from many miles of distance...

I wonder why.