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<div class="moz-cite-prefix">Hi Bradley,<br>
<br>
Thanks for your comments,<br>
<br>
Le 2013-08-27 13:32, Bradley M. Kuhn a écrit :<br>
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:87r4df9h0e.fsf@birch.sfconservancy.org"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">However, the reason we're focusing on USA non-profit accounting needs
first is because I've noticed that many of the existing software projects
make design decisions that preclude adapting their software easily for
USA non-profit use.</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
Perhaps the reason for this is that many of the open source
accounting packages were put together in EU states and not the US.
But personally, I think a Canadian implementation would resemble
more that of a US version than anything else. <br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:87r4df9h0e.fsf@birch.sfconservancy.org"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">
I'm assuming that designers of Free Software accounting systems know
what they are doing, and I thus suspect that it's a substantially tougher
software development task to make an accounting system flexible enough
to handle use-cases under other types of accounting procedures. So many
systems I've surveyed briefly really are only appropriate for a
USA-based for-profit business and not useful for much else. Some are
configurable by jurisdiction, but that's usually special-case code, and
they still end up for-profit biased.
This is in fact one of the reasons I'm a fan of Ledger CLI, as it treats
the double-entry accounting part merely as the "math part" of accounting
and imposes no restrictions. I see people reimplementing double
entry accounting over and over because they don't treat double-entry
accounting as a math library. (It's akin to seeing every person who
wants to write geometry applications reimplementing geometric math to
their specific needs instead of using a math API).
Ideally, we'll design a system that doesn't repeat <b class="moz-txt-star"><span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>that<span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b> mistake, but
we'll surely make a few mistakes and/or bad assumptions. We just
have to try to minimize them, and you can help by staying involved
and watching what we're doing!
Thus, while I am really glad you're here on this list and hope you'll
watch our progress and make sure we're not make bad international design
decisions, I don't think it's good for us to use international plans as
a component of fundraising (yet). We just don't want to overpromise to
funders.</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
I hope that it all works out then with this approach. I personally
would have liked to see more of an international push, but this is
my personal opinion on this. While I agree totally with not having
to "reinvent the wheel" once again, I am personally interested in
the GUI that is adopted. I hope a more familiar GUI is adopted or at
least something that comes close to that of a known package such as
Quickbooks or MYOB (my personal preference). As many organizations
(such as ours) are driven by volunteers and in many cases, some
smaller groups have not enough income to hire an accountant. A GUI
with a short learning curve will at least give these groups a
running chance at figuring out the accounting process without having
to fight with a confusing GUI. <br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:87r4df9h0e.fsf@birch.sfconservancy.org"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite" style="color: #000000;">
<pre wrap=""><span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>BTW ... although it is a little "out-of-date", you may also want to
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>look at the Quasar Accounting package code for when it was open
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>sourced,
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap="">Thanks, I'll add it to the (huge) list I'm keeping of known Open
Source/Free Software accounting systems. <span class="moz-smiley-s1" title=":)"><span>:)</span></span>
</pre>
<blockquote type="cite" style="color: #000000;">
<pre wrap=""><span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>the devs took it back out of open source after having it out there for
<span class="moz-txt-citetags">> </span>a couple of years.
</pre>
</blockquote>
<pre wrap="">Not sure what that means, since Free Software licenses aren't revocable.
I think you mean something else other than they revoked the license, but
there are a number of situations I can imagine that you might describe
with that text above.
Anyway, I <b class="moz-txt-star"><span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span>can<span class="moz-txt-tag">*</span></b> discern that you mean there is at least a version of that
code legitimately under a Free Software license floating around. Do you
know where? It's obviously not on their homepage anymore. <span class="moz-smiley-s1" title=":)"><span>:)</span></span></pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
I believe that you can still get the Quasar 1.4.7 in some Linux
distros repos, but you can download the 1.4.7 version from their
site here: <a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="ftp://ftp.linuxcanada.com/pub/Quasar/1.4.7/">ftp://ftp.linuxcanada.com/pub/Quasar/1.4.7/</a> (some
binaries are made up for when that GPL'd version was available, but
the dependencies are most likely outdated).<br>
<br>
As far as the license not being revocable, at the time, the Quasar
devs wrote to the community that they were no longer going to
develop code for the GPL'd version, although they do generously
allow the use of their present version to anyone for free, which,
for the most part was taken in good faith by most everyone using the
software. Regardless, the GPL'd code from the 1.4.7 version could
still be used as a starting point at least for the GUI part as well
as its implementation of double entry, and, as an added bonus, the
software is still being developed, and, the devs are quite
approachable. Again, they may even be convinced into helping out. <br>
<br>
I would have to ask them again why they quit producing their GPL'd
version, and, am not sure if they just restarted all the code form
scratch.<br>
<br>
It would seem to me that, taking a step back, there could be room
for negotiating good relationship with the Quasar devs and trying to
come to some kind of mutually beneficial relationship. If the look
and feel seems interesting to this project, as well as the
accounting code, then it would most likely be helpful to approach
them. You would really have to try their latest version of Quasar to
get a feel for what the package can do.<br>
<br>
<blockquote cite="mid:87r4df9h0e.fsf@birch.sfconservancy.org"
type="cite">
<pre wrap="">
(I must admit I find it quite disturbing that a company named "Linux
Canada" is primarily a developer of proprietary software. That sullies
the good name of Linux. <span class="moz-smiley-s1" title=":)"><span>:)</span></span>
<div class="moz-txt-sig">--
Bradley M. Kuhn, Executive Director, Software Freedom Conservancy</div></pre>
</blockquote>
Yes, I agree with the first part of your comment, but I don't
believe their intent is to "sully the good name of Linux" as they
actually will produce binaries of different Linux distros of Quasar
(the latest version) if asked nicely. They are quite supportive of
the Linux communities. But, yes, I do agree that perhaps the
"LinuxCanada" label may infringe, although, I seem to remember that
this discussion had already been taken up somewhere on another
discussion list and had come to some kind of assertion where the
name was cleared.<br>
<br>
On another note, thanks for taking on this project as this is one of
my "pet peeves" where, at least here in Canada, our arts
organizations receive some considerable amount of government funding
income, but that when it comes to the non-profit accounting process,
that, more often than not, a large portion of our revenues are spent
on either fund accounting software (mostly Quickbooks with annual
costly updates) or hiring an accountant/agency with fund accounting
specialization. I have been pushing the idea here that the various
government agencies should band together and help create an open
source accounting package that could be made available to our NPO's.
However, I would rather now see this supported on a larger
international scale if the SFC project is going that way.<br>
<br>
Thanks again for your comments.<br>
<br>
Cheers,<br>
<br>
Marc<br>
<br>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Marc Paré<br>
NBBP Director<br>
Treasurer/Marketing<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:Marc.Pare@notabenebaroque.ca">Marc.Pare@notabenebaroque.ca</a><br>
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