[Nel] Snowballs Data & CVS

[Vincent Archer]

According to Vincent Archer:
> Some quick answers, before we go further in detail.

More detail today, as promised :)

> According to Zane:
> > Would it be possible to move the snowballs data into the CVS tree?  I'm
> > keeping current with the CVS updates and evidentally some changes made to
> > NeL or the client/server portion have rendered the data package offered on
> > the website obsolete.
> 
> Hmmm, that's odd. It shouldn't have, but we'll look at it.

We're still using the published data here, so it should not have been
a problem. Are you sure you are using the latest data file? There are
two on the web now, an old (NeL 0.2/Snowballs 0.1) and a new (NeL 0.3
& Snowballs 0.2) packed format (which is a lot smaller).

If you're using the one that came with the very first release, update. If
not, then there's something very odd going on. Open a bug then, and we'll
have a deep look at it.

However, the point you raise is good, because one day we might encounter
that specific problem. I'm checking exactly how we're going to put it,
whether in the code/client tree, a specific code/data tree, or a
fully separate module (since it isn't code per se).

> License issues. Basically, we have a problem releasing a free plugin to
> a commercial non-source software package. The GPL poses a lot of problems
> (we can't give you a GPLed 3DSmax, can we?), and we haven't a satisfying
> license yet that allows to get as close to GPL as we can, while respecting
> the license from 3DS.

I want to stress "we haven't... yet". We're trying to find a good solution
to that problem (which basically boils down to using proprietary software
right now, which limits our freedom of action, as usual).

> > What about design documents for NeL?  You have a lot of auto-generated

We're working on redoing the way we document things. Doxygen is good,
but if no one writes documentation for it, it's as instructive as trying
to learn tu use Unix from just the manual pages.

But that's the usual problem with programming: programmers are interested
in writing code, not writing prose. We strive to keep them from sliding
too much in code-only mode :)

-- 
Vincent Archer                                         Email: archer@nevrax.com

Nevrax France.                              Off on the yellow brick road we go!