[Qt-creator] Question about "kate/ktexteditor" highlighting implementation in QtCreator

[Lars Knoll]

Hi,

> On 14 Aug 2018, at 11:07, Dr.-Ing. Christoph Cullmann <cullmann at absint.com> wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
>>> Hi,
>>> 
>>> at the moment, the KTextEditor team ports away from its old syntax highlighting
>>> engine (which was reimplemented some years ago in QtCreator) to the new
>>> KSyntaxHighlighting framework (a Qt only KF5 framework).
>>> 
>>> https://api.kde.org/frameworks/syntax-highlighting/html/index.html
>>> https://cgit.kde.org/syntax-highlighting.git/about/
>>> 
>>> After this is done, we will do some incompatible changes to the xml files (that
>>> are reused by QtCreator at the moment).
>>> 
>>> I know that in the past there was no chance to reuse the KTextEditor/Kate
>>> implementation
>>> due to licensing/dependencies issues.
>>> 
>>> Would it be possible to reuse the framework above to stay compatible and share
>>> code/maintenance
>>> effort?
>> 
>> That would be desirable goal :)
> I hoped some, too.

Sharing that code would IMO be great. I don't see why we should maintain our own code for parsing those syntax highlighter definitions :)
> 
>> 
>>> At the moment the framework is LGPLv2+, but even relicensing to something
>>> more liberal is at the moment still possible, if that would allow better
>>> collaboration.
>> 
>> Thanks for contacting us on that question! I’ve added Lars as our Chief
>> Maintainer to CC.
> I added the maintainer of syntax-highlighting Volker Krause in CC.
> Actually both are at akademy at the moment and perhaps can just talk
> about the thing in person if wanted.

We had a good talk at Academy today, and both agreed that it would be good if we could re-use the same component in all places (including Qt Creator).
> 
>> 
>> Our 3rd-party license policy is documented here:
>> https://quips-qt-io.herokuapp.com/quip-0004.html#acceptable-licenses
>> 
>> It boils down to:
>> * MIT or BSD or anything that is basically the same is no problem to include for
>> us
>> * L(GPL) might be ok in some cases, but usually not for “core” parts
>> 
>> (That last part about “core” parts is written in the policy with the Qt hat on
>> as “part of Qt Essentials", but for Qt Creator I’d interpret that in a similar
>> manner.)

MIT or BSD is easiest. For various reasons I would very much prefer not to add L(GPL) dependencies to any parts of Qt.
>> 
>> I’d say that the generic text highlighting is a “core” part in Qt Creator, so it
>> would be good if a 3rd-party library for that would be MIT/BSD-style, otherwise
>> we probably cannot use it.
> 
> I think if the license would be the last issue, we can try to find some common ground
> for that.

That would be great. Then the remaining issue for us would be to find the time to do the porting to the new engine.

Cheers,
Lars

> 
> Thanks already for the quick response.
> 
>> 
>> Best regards, Eike
> 
> Greetings
> Christoph
> 
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