Re: [PATCH] gnu: sdcv: Add new variable.

[Tomáš Čech]

On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 02:28:25PM +0100, Ludovic Courtès wrote:
> Tomáš Čech <address@hidden> skribis:
>
> > On Wed, Mar 18, 2015 at 09:39:49AM +0100, Ludovic Courtès wrote:
> > > Tomáš Čech <address@hidden> skribis:
> > >
> > > > * gnu/packages/dictionaries.scm (sdcv): New variable.
> > >
> > > You pushed it already but I have some comments anyway:
> >
> > Oh, I took that there are no objections already. Sorry about that.
>
> That’s OK, I just happened to have comments.  ;-)
>
> > > > +(define-public sdcv
> > > > +  (package
> > > > +    (name "sdcv")
> > > > +    (version "0.5.0-beta4")
> > >
> > > The policy is to provide only stable versions, unless there’s a very
> > > good reason to do otherwise.  Could we use the previous version until
> > > 0.5.0 is out?
> >
> > Previous version of this tool is 0.4.2, which is 8 years old, it won't work 
> > with recent compilers (it's their statement, not my experiment though), could 
> > suffer with allignment issues on more exotic architectures (ARM among them).
>
> Sounds like a good reason.  “beta4” suggests 0.5.0 will soon be released
> though, no?

I'd rather not speculate - beta2 was released 2013-07-07, beta4 was
released 2014-10-24. If there is planned beta7, it may be released
after GNU Hurd.

> > I can add comment with the reasoning.
>
> Yes please.
>
> > > > +    (synopsis "Command line variant of StarDict")
> > >
> > > Could you change it to be self-contained–i.e., without referring to
> > > StarDict (which I don’t know, and perhaps is not very well known.)
> >
> > sdcv stands for - StarDict Command line Variant
> > This is where I took the synopsis from.
> >
> > It's hard to believe that you have never heard of StarDict. I'm not
> > aware of any offline sotfware dictionary software which does not
> > support StarDict dictionary format and doesn't state it's relation to
> > stardict - be it GoldenDict, QStardict or this sdcv.
>
> What I have heard of doesn’t really matter–hopefully I’m not the only
> user of this.  ;-)
>
> Anyway, “StarDict-compatible command-line dictionary program” maybe?

OK.


> Now that I try to learn about StarDict, I stumble upon this at
> <http://stardict.sourceforge.net/>:
>
>  The original StarDict project has recently been removed from
>  SourceForge due to copyright infringement reports.

It's hard to find anything now but AFAIR they hosted besides the
software also data, which weren't respecting copyright of original
source.

> And at <http://sdcv.sourceforge.net/>, sdvc describes itself as the
> “console version of [the] StarDict program”, which is not
> confidence-inspiring.  Some files such as dictziplib.cpp do indeed seem
> to come from StarDict.

I wasn't afraid before but now it works as FUD from the sf.net side
because the lack of information available.

> Could you check if you can find more information?  It’s in Debian and
> not on <http://libreplanet.org/wiki/NONFSDG>, which is encouraging.


The file you mentioned looks like from stardict project, but was
originally taken from dictd-1.9.7 as it states and during it's history
it always had GPL license (started with GPL1).


But there are also similarities between
stardict-3.0.4/dict/src/lib/mapfile.h
and
sdcv-0.5.0-beta4-Source/src/mapfile.hpp

and that is missing license in sdcv completely.

Further - distance.cpp (GPL) and distance.hpp (no license in header)
are probably related among projects.

Lets scratch it whole, I'm not laywer.

When there is webkit package, I may give a try to GoldenDict.

S_W


> > Is this satisfactory?:
> > "Sdcv is command line dictionary utility with support of StarDict
>
> “with support for the StarDict”
>
> > dictionary format.  For word in one language it can find translation
> > in all installed dictionaries at the same time and without specifying
> > original language.
>
> What about “It can translate words from any language to any other language
> for which a dictionary is available.”?
>
> > With proper dictionary it can also work as encyclopedic dictionary."
>
> “can also work as an encyclopedia”

Thanks for the fixes.

S_W

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