AutoHotkey Community

Unlike AutoIt v3, to my knowledge the AutoIt v2 source was never released in any form, GPL or otherwise.

AutoHotkey does use AutoIt v3 source code for about 40 commands. For a complete list, see http://www.autohotkey.com/forum/viewtop ... 9710#19710

I don't know what they want. I'm just "watching" both forums und was wondering about the similarities...

Hm... quite drastic steps...

BTW: I just checked the functions Chris has taken from AutoIT (the 40 ones he mentioned). The only credit I could find was this one line.

// TAKEN FROM THE AUTOIT3 SOURCE

There is no reference to the AutoIT project and the programmers. Hm.. I thought it is common practice in the OpenSource community to give appropriate credit to the original authors of the code, which would include the URL of the project, the authors, date, copyright, etc. !???!

But as I'm very new to this, I might be wrong

I checked, and you are right about there being hardly any direct references to the AutoIt3 project in the sourcecode of AutoHotkey.

However, AutoIt(3) is mentioned many times in the comments. It should be clear, and it is from the Help-file, that portions of the code of AutoHotkey were taken from the AutoIt3 project, credit where credit is due.

So, maybe Chris should indeed make clearer references in the source, especially since this turned out to be such a touchy subject.

The issue here is that the AutoIt3 team got p'ed of by AutoHotkey using it's code, and - in their opinion - not giving enough credit. I feel Chris made up for this in the Help file, where their team is mentioned and credited fully, but you are right about the sourcecode needing more info on this.

The 'old' AutoIt2/Legacy version served as a framework for AutoHotkey in terms of syntax, and parts of the open source from the AutoIt3 project were used for improving AutoHotkey, so, how much more credit can you get?

Since AutoIt3's source is/was (they are changing the licence probably because of this issue) open, and therefore useable, I don't really understand their problem... AutoHotkey is open source too, they can take good code from AutoHotkey and implement it in AutoIt3 in turn...

Both AutoIt and AutoHotkey turned out to be excellent automation utilities, each with their own pro's and con's, most notably AutoHotkey's syntax being easier/less code necessary and it's support for hotkeys/hotstrings, and AutoIt's power (more mature then AutoHotkey), more utilities and 'higher level' programming syntax...

AutoIt3 went thru the 'virus-reporting' stage already, meaning scripters used it to write malicious code. As a consequence, they choose to not have hotkey support (which could be used for keylogging activities), and disabled some other options too. Yesterday my virusscanner gave a warning on the AutoHotkey installer, after updating the signatures, it didn't anymore, but it looks as if the first malicious programs were written with AutoHotkey already too... Hopefully this won't influence AutoHotkeys capabilities.

It depends on what you as user likes, it's not really necessary to start bashing each other's products, since they are both very good...

AutoIt3 however is leaning towards closing their source now, which p'sses off some of their coders (too), since they were under the impression of contributing to an open project. Hopefully the AutoIt3 team will come to senses, and accept that the nature of an open source project is that others can, will and even should use their code.

I have a strong feeling that Chris wants to keep AutoHotkey open, and it would be a true shame if he'd would want to close it somehow someday, but I don't think he wants to do that.

which is, how I understand it, common practice in the OpenSource community. So, is it such a big deal to add that reference, especially as AHK has some real good benefit from using the AutoIT source code?? Ask Chris said in his post:

However, without the use of AutoIt v3 source code, the following commands would never have existed or would have taken a lot longer to develop:



Actually I could not find any more detailed reference in the help file as well.... The only thing I found was this (did a search for AutoIT in the help file).

A special thanks to Jonathan Bennett, whose generosity in releasing AutoIt v2 as free software in 1999 served as an inspiration and time-saver for myself and many others worldwide. In addition, many of AutoHotkey's enhancements to the AutoIt v2 command set, as well as the Window Spy and the script compiler, were adapted directly from the AutoIt v3 source code. So thanks to Jon and the other AutoIt authors for those as well.

That's not bad, however far less than I know from other OpenSource projects. Especially, there is no reference to the projects home page. Is there any reason for this?

I don't know what happened between the developpers of AHK and AutoIT (and I don't care), but I think it's just fair to give adequate credit to those people whose code I use.



again, is it that hard to add appropriate credit?? Where is the point here? It's just a few text lines. I guess you are right. It realy seems to be a "touchy subject", I guess for both sides.



Well, everyone should compare the credits given by AHK with other OpenSource projects and judge on their own.



I guess that's true.

Actually there is. Each of the 40 commands derived from the AutoIt source is credited individually to AutoIt. In addition, when I know the name of the developer responsible, I try to include it. For example, if you search script2.cpp for Holger, you will find the following comment: "Adapted from AutoIt3 source code, credited to Holger <Holger.Kotsch at GMX de>"

As far as I know, it is not common practice to put project URLs in the headers of the source code. For example, if you look at the top of the file "os_version.cpp" -- which is a file from the AutoIt project -- there are no URLs other than an e-mail address.

As for copyright, each file from the AutoIt project retains its original header, complete with AutoIt copyright. In addition, each part of the source that was derived from AutoIt prominently lists AutoIt as the origin.

Since most AutoHotkey users are not programmers, they are never likely to look at its source code. Therefore, I put the most elaborate credits to AutoIt on the main page of the help file. This page is the very first thing new users see when they run the installer with the default options. The top of the page contains the copyright info, which has been the same since the very first release in February 2004:
(The phrase "AutoIt Team" has always been a direct link to the AutoIt site).

Then at the bottom of the main page is the following, which has also been the same since the initial release in February 2004:

This is true. However, the core syntax of AutoIt v2 was derived directly from Microsoft's ScriptIt, whose syntax is described here.

That is definitely the case.

Thanks for your comments.

Now it has turned into a "A question of honour" - debate. I've realized that there's something specific regarding developers and their babies (aka code). Only incestuous code is good code. And you have to have a code genealogy, regardless that only a minority of users (correction: its developers) even care about. Even once they left that planet some lawyers will have some amunition to start an AU3 vs. AHK case (d'ya remember that SCO vs. IBM s... ?)

Children dying, and those geeks wasting time & energy discussing such egocentric bollocks (:shock:, if you're from the US please read that "beep"-word instead of the unanticipated, but explicit word)

Well, I thought children are dying because Mr. Bush commanded to drop bombs on them in order to get hold of the oil fields !???!

But that's something completely different and one can allways argument with the suffering of other people. I think we should stick with AHK and AutoIT here.

Yes, as I said with one single line:

// TAKEN FROM THE AUTOIT3 SOURCE

Whereas the header of the file script2.cpp states, that you hold the copyright. That's a kind of a discrepancy, isn't it? I don't care, as it is not my code, but if it was, I would be p*ed. Why should I accept that somebody else gets the credits for my work?



That is actually the only credit comment with the name of an author. However there are several, unspecific, comments like this:

// Adapted from the AutoIt3 source.




The credits shown in that file and script_registry.cpp are actually the form I would have expected to see in an OpenSource project, that uses code from another project. So, is it too hard to add those headers to the files and code taken from AutoIT?



Come on, programmers don't expect users to read the source code. So appropriate credits are only interesting within the community of programmers and thus, the more important credits are those in the source code. You should know that, because you added your copyright at the top of each source file!




Thanks for your comments.

Seems to me if we spend so much time on this subject we cannot be about the business of developing more AHK code/features.

PEACE!

I see this this topic a bit differently. I think its great that we have two tools that are publicly available and that we could migrate to/from relatively easily if development were to end on either. Makes either one more valuable and a great tool to work with.

Why I've the idea that this ethical thing is kinda proxy war kindergarden tactic ?!

Although I believe the source code already complies with both the letter and spirit of the GPL, I'll amend the relevant code sections to indicate the original AutoIt copyright line.

A lot more than I would do... IMO if the code is from another source then it should be marked from another source. Period. Marking each and every single section with a full header, author's name, address, etc... is riddiculous. I would include one file with info on where various portions of the code were obtained, can be found and a contact for the authors. After that, if a section of code was all or mostly from another project then a simple line like // TAKEN FROM THE AUTOIT3 SOURCE should most certainly be enough IMO. Want more info? Research the original document...

My opinion might be a bit different if a person complaining about a lack of credit in a project identified themself though...

Is AutoIt giving any credit to ScriptIt !!!! Should the authors of ScriptIT or WinBatch chase down Jon???

FREE: AutoIt a Replacement for ScriptIt
11/21/2000 11:12 pm
Contributed By: Darwin Sanoy

A while back Microsoft published a dumbed down version of WinBatch called "ScriptIt" ScriptIt is used for low-intensity interface automation. Apparently it also inspired Jonathan Bennett to create a new and improved version. Jonathan's version has many improvements over ScriptIt, the most notable of them being the ability to compile scripts into executables and a custom control to allow interface automation through Windows Scripting Host (WSH) languages such as VBScript or JScript.

Thanks go to Tim Plas for letting me know about this great utility.

KEYWORDS: VBS, SCRIPTING, WSH

http://desktopengineer.com/story_20001121231238368


Command comparison between ScriptIt and AutoIt


http://tiger.la.asu.edu/Quick_Ref/AutoIt_quickref.pdf


Some key points:

. Chris does give plenty of credit to the AutoIt team. The guy is not denying or hiding the influence of AutoIt. He mentions them in many places and give credit to the MANY people that have contributed to the AutoIt project.

. AutoIt was open source freeware. So nobody can blame Chris for using it. And before anybody does, what about ScriptIT??? Was ScriptIt open source freeware??? I'm not implying Jon stole any code, but I am saying that an influence and a link to Scriptit obviously seems to be there.

If the creator of the program does not want anybody to borrow ideas (which you can not prevent) or code from his program than it needs to be closed source, encrypted, payware, etc...

There is nothing wrong in being inspired by somebody else's design, in order to do your own variation. AutoHotkey, in addition to its many similarities to AutoIt, has many major differences as well.