libofx in Debian

[Christian Stimming]

Quoting Thomas Bushnell BSG <tb at becket.net>:
>> GnuCash has a built-in importer for OFX files in the src/import-export/ofx
>> module. This importer requires libofx.
>
> What happens if libofx is available, but the important functionality
> reports an error instead of doing the usual thing?  Does gnucash fail
> gracefully or badly in this case?  (This is crucial for my decision
> about whether to cripple or drop libofx from Debian, if that turns out
> to be necessary.)

GnuCash (and probably any other application) will fail badly.

In fact, after thinking about it for a while, your idea with packaging  
libofx without the OFX DTDs sounds even worse for me. I mean, the  
whole point of libofx is processing OFX. Shipping it without that  
feature is like shipping a lib-foo-print package without printing  
functionality. Iff you decide to do this, you should at least rename  
it into something like libofx-noofx or similar. But with the name  
"libofx" you should package only something that can actually process  
OFX data.

> Ok, I'm not certain I understand one point.  If libofx is not
> configured, but aqbanking is, then gnucash "Import OFX file" will be
> gone, but OFX Direct Connect and HBCI will be available.  (Assuming that
> aqbanking is working fine for whichever of these is chosen, that is.)

Yes.

>> As for porting GnuCash to aqbanking-3.x: The newer library is not source
>> compatible to the older one at all. (...) I won't do this  because  
>> I don't have time.
>
> Right.  Of course, aqbanking2 will not be maintained anymore, so the
> work will have to be done eventually regardless, right?

Yes.

>> For importing OFX files into gnucash, libofx is required and it is   
>> going to be
>> this way until someone rewrites the "Import OFX file" to use a different
>> parser.  (...)
>
> Gotcha.
>
> How public are these things?  Perhaps the HBCI/OFX users could be
> recruited to help out.

There are many HBCI and OFX users here on this list; I'm open for  
anyone to offer help. The notes about required work are collected on  
http://wiki.gnucash.org/wiki/AqBanking3_Porting

> The problem with libofx is much worse than the problem with aqbanking2
> and the GPL.  Currently, libofx is itself violating the copyright on the
> relevant DTD files, as far as I can tell.

I disagree. The distribution of libofx with its GPL source code and  
these DTDs is perfectly fine. However, I agree that the resulting  
package (source code plus DTDs) is not "fully GPL"; it is "source code  
GPL plus additional non-GPL files (which are allowed to be  
redistributed though)". If this is a relevant criterion for Debian  
about whether you like to redistribute this package, fine, that's up  
to Debian. I'd say the license wording ("make and use [this DTDs] for  
products that conform to this specification") is enough of a  
permission to create parts of gnucash as derived works of libofx (the  
GPL source code part) and also redistribute gnucash with libofx, and  
IMHO there is no violated copyright anywhere.

Christian