Re: Grammar checking

[Lynn Winebarger <owinebar@gmail.com>]

On Fri, Apr 7, 2023 at 11:28 PM Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> wrote:
>   > Perhaps the LanguageTool.org owners would consider this a violation of
>   > their service's terms and conditions as a justification for not accepting
>   > contributions of source code to the project.

I recall writing this, but I thought there was additional context.
Unfortunately I can't locate my original email for reference.  I am
sure I did not intend the following inference.

> This seems to assume that a developer has an obligation to install any change
> that "is an improvement" and must submit a "justification" for not adding it.
>
> That seems very strange to me.  I think any developer is entitled to
> reject a change and does not have to justify rejecting it.

Sure.  My question was whether the GNU project condones introducing
dependencies in GNU software X on a software *project* Y such that
attempts to improve functionality in X will only be incorporated by Y
if they do not reduce the value of proprietary or SaaSS offering Z
which Y promotes.  While the developer has every right to control
their distribution of software, potential contributors also have every
right to consider whether or how a contribution will be considered.
For me, I simply would not consider making a contribution under the
LGPL to a project that might reject it for the free project but
incorporate it into their SaaSS.  It's not like there would be any way
to tell if that happened.  The only way I would contribute to such
software would be in a fork under an Affero-style copyleft license,
which as you note below, can be quite a bit of trouble.

>   > We could consider forking that code in a limited way: adding new rules.
>
> We can consider forking in any manner whatsoever.  Of course, forking
> the free version of LanguageTool has a practical downside (more work
> for us!) as well as an upside.  We might decide it is not worth the
> trouble.

I appear to have messed up the quoting here - that sentence was from
one of your earlier replies.

Lynn