Re: Is there a reason why GNUnet forcefully sends a message of type 6?

[Alessio Vanni]

Christian Grothoff <address@hidden> writes:

> Actually, no. Type 6 implements our *Affero* GPL mechanism to provide
> anyone who accesses *any* GNUnet service with the means to download the
> source code. GNUnet is released under the AGPL, which specifically
> states that such a mechanism to obtain the source must not be disabled.
>
> So a third-party application would be in violation of the AGPL license
> if it disabled this particular handler. Basically, that's the one
> "freedom" the *Affero* GPL takes away: the freedom to remove or disable
> a "download source" mechanism.

I'm not sure I understood: you are saying that third-party application
must proved a mechanism to ask for GNUnet's AGPL URL even if the
application itself is not licensed under the AGPL or is part of GNUnet
core?  I'm not an expert of that license so I don't know what it means
to use it or interfacing with a library (even just libgnunetutil)
licensed under the AGPL.

> Finally, in general we'll want even third-party applications to use
> message types that are "registered" globally. We recently setup
> https://gana.gnunet.org/ which will be used to facilitate this.

Again, I'm missing something: are applications required to register a
global message type even though the service doesn't communicate over the
network?  What I'm working on is currently structured like this (though
it's not a design set in stone; also sorry for the terribly-drawn
diagram):

Peer <--------------> local-service-1 <------------> local-service-3
                                ^                     ^          ^
                     client-1 <-|                     |          |
                                                      |          |
Peer <--------------> local-service-2 <---------------|          |
                                                                 |
                                                   client-2 <----|

"local-service-3" is meant to be accessed only by programs (clients or
services) running locally, while network communcations with other peers
are done by the other services.  In this case, will "local-service-3"
have to register its message types globally despite being accessible
only locally?

Thanks,
A.V.