From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Ken Raeburn Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Splint Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2010 12:35:06 -0500 Message-ID: <28535EDD-D486-419B-83B0-D7E9962DD36D@raeburn.org> References: <27057818.post@talk.nabble.com> <5309A4F9-E516-49E5-83CA-80B9DA50D92B@raeburn.org> NNTP-Posting-Host: lo.gmane.org Mime-Version: 1.0 (Apple Message framework v936) Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed; delsp=yes Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Trace: ger.gmane.org 1262972140 27308 80.91.229.12 (8 Jan 2010 17:35:40 GMT) X-Complaints-To: usenet@ger.gmane.org NNTP-Posting-Date: Fri, 8 Jan 2010 17:35:40 +0000 (UTC) Cc: alinsoar@voila.fr, Emacs-devel@gnu.org To: rms@gnu.org Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Fri Jan 08 18:35:32 2010 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([199.232.76.165]) by lo.gmane.org with esmtp (Exim 4.50) id 1NTIkG-0002nM-6a for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 18:35:32 +0100 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:55812 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NTIkG-00023z-Nf for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:32 -0500 Original-Received: from mailman by lists.gnu.org with tmda-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NTIkA-0001zx-II for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:26 -0500 Original-Received: from exim by lists.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.43) id 1NTIk6-0001rP-Jw for Emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:26 -0500 Original-Received: from [199.232.76.173] (port=51158 helo=monty-python.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.43) id 1NTIk6-0001rB-FD for Emacs-devel@gnu.org; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:22 -0500 Original-Received: from splat.raeburn.org ([69.25.196.39]:51015 helo=raeburn.org) by monty-python.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS-1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.60) (envelope-from ) id 1NTIjw-0004O6-RZ; Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:35:20 -0500 Original-Received: from [10.1.12.41] (vpn.permabit.com [204.246.225.2]) by raeburn.org (8.14.3/8.14.1) with ESMTP id o08HZ9On022065; Fri, 8 Jan 2010 12:35:10 -0500 (EST) In-Reply-To: X-Mailer: Apple Mail (2.936) X-detected-operating-system: by monty-python.gnu.org: Genre and OS details not recognized. X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Original-Sender: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:119712 Archived-At: On Jan 8, 2010, at 08:17, Richard Stallman wrote: > While Coverity's stuff is commercial, > > Do you mean "proprietary"? They are not the same. There is nothing > wrong with a program's being commercial. See > http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html. Yes, sorry, I mis-spoke. > they've offered its use to some > open-source/free software projects. > > See http://www.gnu.org//philosophy/mcvoy.html > for the story about another similar offer, > and the harm that was done when someone else accepted it. Yep, there is that issue. At least in this case it is still practical and easy for someone to use splint and other free or at least open- source software, while someone else uses something like Coverity's tools. Unlike Bitkeeper and Linux kernel source access, the proprietary tools shouldn't intrude significantly on those who don't want to use it in their development work. I'd still love to see a free tool to do this work. But when I did a survey for work a few years back, my impression was that the free tools were all poor; splint appeared to be one of the best of the lot, and was quite a pain to try to use. Perhaps with recent work on gcc, llvm and other tools, the situation can be changed. Ken