Petition to have ResEdit open-sourced

So my argument is that if apple isn't going to do anything to the source code, they should let other people have it. Make resedit open-source.

The main reason why they should do this is: Why not? There's only a couple of reasons why you wouldn't open-source something, and none of them apply here. Resedit is free, so releasing the code wouldn't exactly make piracy or cracking of it easier. They aren't going to be compromising valuable intellectual property of apple, since they aren't going to be reusing the code for anything, it's free, and apple doesn't use the program anyway. And resedit is aimed at the few people who would be likely to actually be able to use the source code were it released.

Beyond that, an open-source resedit makes things no more difficult for apple than closed, and having it open would allow people to create things with the source code apple possibly couldn't have done on its own, as well as helping learning developers by giving them example code.

You could make the almost exact same arguments for MPW Shell and MacsBug (except for the not-being-updated bit), and there's little reason apple shouldn't open-source them as well.

Comments on this should be mailed here.
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There was a little cgi type thing here that would append your comment to a file. That was when this page was hosted on earthlink. I have not yet checked on how to go about doing this with swbell.net's allowed cgi. If swbell does not have an appendto script, i could easily find accomodation elseware. However i am not going to attempt this because i feel the petition has failed. I am giving up on it; i may later do one last-ditch drive for signatures, but i doubt apple will pay attention now if they weren't before. If you desperately want your signature added for some reason, mail me and i will put it on manually.

Anyway here's some e-mail i've gotten in reply to the petition..

This guy named Thomas Weisbach sent me the following e-mail:

Although I think it would be good if Apple open-sourced ResEdit, MPW and other technologies, I don't think Apple is ready to open source MacsBug. MacsBug is still being updated within Apple and there are sporadic new released. Inside Apple it is updated for new processors and other technologies needed within Apple.

Also, someone who asked not to have his name used sent the following:

I commend your effort to Open Source ResEdit, but I don't think you'll be happy if you got it. I am a former Apple Engineer. ResEdit is written in mostly Pascal and 68K Asm. Also the code bypasses the Resource Mgr and therefor has some qwerks that make it difficult to extend.

A 3rd party wrote version 3.0 and Apple doesn't have the rights to distribute the source...

This is a very good point. I'm sure he's right. Resedit has a long history, so the code would be a mess. Especially since apple has so little incentive to work on it. If so that would be a Bad Thing. Anyway i asked him about Resedit 3.0, and he replied with:

...ResEdit 3.0 was the "from ground up" rewrite of ResEdit for Copland (although it should be useful on MacOS 8/X as well). This version was developed using a third party framework. The framework is a core piece of how it dynamically parses and lays out data in it's windows. The framework was licensed for Apple internal use only, and can't be delivered in source form outside Apple. The third party that developed it have used it in a number of other commercial applications. I don't think the third party had any rights to the ResEdit specific App code...

Also, someone pointed out to me that as soon as Mac OS X shows up Resedit will suddenly become worthless, as the entire system of using Resources is replaced with something else.

But really the point here is that creating Open Source Software is something apple should seriously consider, especially for its developer utilities. Of course there are other things more important it could be opensourcing: for instance, the mac os x kernel (which is actually the Mach kernel.. which they didn't write. they just made some modifications) (or do i have the microkernel and the kernel confused?). There have also been rumors they plan to open-source the server software for Quicktime 4 whenever it comes out, which would definately be useful to a great many people.

And of course, whatever method replaces the Resource Manager in OS X will need some sort of tool to edit its files.. could they open-source THAT? Anyway, apple has in fact decided they were going to release code to large chunks of OS X Server's low levels! Of course parts of this were not written by apple and thus available in slightly different form. But the fact is that the rules are slightly different now that Apple has shown they're willing to release source code if they feel it will help people. This is good.

This petition has thus far been mailed to a number of random e-mail adresses at apple. The only response came from feedbackresponse@info.apple.com:

Andrew,

Thank you for your recent email detailing suggestions for improving Apple's business practices and/or products.

Apple recognizes that our best advice comes from our customers, and we appreciate the efforts you have made to share your opinion with us. Your comments will be reviewed by members of Apple's management team so that improvements can be implemented as necessary.

Thank you for your continued support of Apple.

Regards,
- Debbie