http://blog.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general hourly 1 1901-01-01T00:00+00:00 http://gmane.org/img/gmane-25t.png http://gmane.org http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12219 <pre> Attention! Your PayPal account will close soon! Dear Member, We have faced some problems with your account Please update the account .If you do not update will be Closed. To Update your account, just confirm your informations.(It only takes a minute.) It's easy: Click the link below to open a secure browser window. Confirm that you're the owner of the account, and then follow the instructions. Relog in your account now Please do not reply to this email. We are unable to respond to inquiries sent to this address. For immediate answers to your questions, visit our Help Center by clicking "Help" at the top of any PayPal page. Copyright © 2012 PayPal Inc. All rights reserved. PayPal is located at 2211 N. First St., San Jose, CA 95131. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> service< at >paypal.com 2012-05-11T21:37:23 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12215 <pre> On a related note, I recently came across Warrick, a tool for reconstructing past versions of a website, that might come in handy to the folks on this list for various purposes: http://code.google.com/p/warrick/wiki/About_Warrick For example, I am currently using Warrick to reconstruct a past copy of a large site that recently decided to stop distributing its content under a CC license. </pre> Michael Bernstein 2012-04-30T23:20:21 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12200 <pre>Hullo List, For a scientific computing project, I'd like to encourage redistribution of software upon publication of research results (e.g. academic journals) by third parties using our code. I'm not currently aware of any license geared toward this scenario. (There are lots of examples of academic journals requiring this, but I'm having a difficult time tracking down a license for /code/ that is generally used to inform an academic publication. More specifically, the sub-sub discipline for which the code I have written will potentially be used currently does not run rich with a FOSS ethos.) As an example, if we license our code under the GPL, then folks who publish papers with results from use of our software are never redistributing any /software/, only publishing a paper, and are thus not required to share code. However, we feel from a scientific standpoint that it's crucial that the code (*and* data) used for publication results be shared. The closest I've been able to find is the EPPA license, which has this as provision 6 (currently available from: http://globalchange.mit.edu/research/IGSM/eppadl_form ): ----- 6. Any party which publishes results from a modification of the Software Model must also publish the source code of their modifications, in the same form as the Software Model is here released, and under the same license terms. Said party must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that the files were changed and the date of the change. ----- Unfortunately, there are other parts of the license which are not acceptable to us (e.g. we do not want to limit non-academic use) So, are there other licenses geared toward code (and data) used for academic publications? Also, in the case that there are no other licenses acceptable/available to us, a second, meta-license question: How are the texts of the various OSI approved licenses themselves licensed? Are they free for folks to modify? (Perhaps to be described as a 'modified-OSI license' when used ...?) Also, please, I'm not looking for responses along the lines of "you can't enforce it so ignore it." I'm very specifically focused on the licensing aspect. (As they say, "One problem at a time!") Thank you, Kevin _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Kevin Hunter 2012-04-30T15:36:57 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12181 <pre> Perhaps it would be most productive for license-discuss to proceed under the assumption that OSI would like to fill a more constructive role in the community, and discuss what a license list published by that sort of OSI would look like. In parallel, the board and affiliates can discuss whether a more proactive role is appropriate. If the affiliates and board approve of a more active, forward-looking role for OSI, then OSI can follow through on what license-discuss advises in this thread. If they would prefer to remain in the current, filter-only-for-OSD position, then this will have been an interesting thought experiment for someone else to build on. Luis _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Luis Villa 2012-04-05T18:22:25 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12175 <pre>On Thu, Apr 5, 2012 at 7:08 AM, Christopher Allan Webber &lt;cwebber&lt; at &gt;dustycloud.org&gt; wrote: Without getting into other issues, I'd hope we can agree that BSD/MIT do not belong in a first-class list here in 2012. Apache fills the same purpose[1] (permissive license) while being better drafted and properly handling patents. Even if the rest of Karl's proposal does not go through, and nothing else changes with the license list pages, I'd be perfectly happy moving BSD and MIT to the redundant or superseded lists. Luis [1] The very short version of my objection to removal of MPL is that it addresses a clear need (predictable, compatible copyleft) that is not otherwise addressed. Apache, BSD, and MIT address the same need (permissive license). The only possible justification for BSD/MIT is GPL v2 compatibility, but if that's why we're leaving them in the list, then that should be called out as the only justification for using them. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Luis Villa 2012-04-05T14:30:57 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12168 <pre>The CPOL 1.02 license was discussed on this list in 2009. [1, and see attached.) As far as I can tell from reading my old emails and reviewing the OSI license list, it was never approved by OSI. Richard Fontana said this about it on 10/5/2009: This license recently came to our attention at Red Hat. The CPOL fails to meet the Open Source Definition (and Free Software Definition) in numerous ways. I've already been in contact with people at codeproject.com about this. Yet Black Duck reports that this is the 8th most popular open source license. [1] Popularity isn't all that matters! /Larry [1] http://www.codeproject.com/info/cpol10.aspx [2] http://osrc.blackducksoftware.com/data/licenses/ Lawrence Rosen Rosenlaw &amp; Einschlag, a technology law firm (www.rosenlaw.com) 3001 King Ranch Road, Ukiah, CA 95482 Cell: 707-478-8932 _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Lawrence Rosen 2012-04-04T23:32:09 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12150 <pre>(This may be more controversial than my last post -- we'll see.) For many people, the OSI web site is a first source of information about open source licenses. Historically, we haven't tried to steer newcomers toward choosing the most popular / widely-recognized licenses, probably because we thought it more important to remain neutral among all OSI-approved licenses. Times change, though. These days we have a better sense of which licenses are most used and where, and even more experience with the problem of license proliferation. Also, somewhat related to the above, our license pages are a bit hard to navigate. One click from the front page the user is faced with a choice ("alphabetical" vs "by category"), and neither choice quite answers the questions newcomers are most likely to have -- although to be fair the by-category page makes an effort to. I think it's possible to steer newcomers toward a small set of widely-used licenses without denigrating or hiding all the other licenses, and to present all our licenses in a way that's more helpful to newcomers while still being useful for experienced people who just need a reference. So I've drafted this page: http://opensource.org/licenses-draft I'm not really seeking consensus about it -- I think it unlikely we'll have consensus about something like this. Ultimately, the Board will have to decide. But I am seeking feedback and corrections, e.g., "The XYZ license is much more/less popular than you think!" or "The FooBar license is not FSF-approved, so maybe it should be listed father down, since all other things being equal we don't want to push a non-FSF-approved license over approved ones". or "There's a better way to present what you're trying to present; let me show you..." ...that sort of thing. I used both external sources [1] and my own domain knowledge to come up with the groupings on the page. But I know many people here have a lot of licensing experience, and welcome suggestions for better ordering or grouping. What I'd like to do is to make this page be "/licenses" on the web site </pre> Karl Fogel 2012-04-04T18:40:40 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12144 <pre>(This seems appropriate for both license-discuss&lt; at &gt; and license-review&lt; at &gt;, so I'm posting it in both places.) I've been seeing an increasing number of inquiries about the public domain and open source, and about CC0 and open source. A few of those inquiries have come here, but I'm also getting them elsewhere. So I've tried to formulate good answers: http://opensource.org/faq#public-domain http://opensource.org/faq#cc-zero I hope I've reflected the general consensus of the License Review committee accurately, not made any legal mistakes, etc. I'd appreciate feedback on these. The "public domain" entry is complex. It felt wrong to simply say that PD is not open source, when it clearly exhibits most or all of the important properties of Open Source and is at least capable of meeting the OSD; on the other hand, it is not a license and therefore cannot be OSI-approved, and it has some portability problems. So I've tried to express all of that in the answer, and recommend that people use OSI-approved licenses wherever possible. The CC0 entry is more straightforward, but also would benefit from peer review. Please hold the flamethrowers, anyone who might be tempted to flame, and remember that these are inherently contentious and complicated subjects! It would be easier for the OSI to just say nothing on the topics :-), but silence on these questions would not serve our mission very well. Thanks, -Karl _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Karl Fogel 2012-04-04T00:53:45 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12142 <pre>Dear Open Source (License) Community, As recently indicated, Deutsche Telekom AG (DTAG) has now published the initial, very early version of an Open Source License Compendium. It is a) licensed under the 'Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Germany' [http://dtag-dbu.github.com/oslic/en/oslic/license.html], b) published as an eBook (pdf) [http://dtag-dbu.github.com/oslic/en/planning/results.html] c) realized by a LaTeX based 'development environment' hosted as an open and free GitHub project [https://github.com/dtag-dbu/oslic] We describe our intention in our home page (also hosted on GitHub) [http://dtag-dbu.github.com/oslic/] and specify the cooperation as far as it's possible for the moment [http://dtag-dbu.github.com/oslic/en/collaboration/repository.html]. Additionally, the items of the column 'download' explain how to prepare, how to obtain, how to install, and how to use the development environment. [Anyway, you will directly see, that we find a solution for solving our logo challenge ;-)] Please feel free to visit/review our work. But don't be too disappointed: publishing early and often means starting with a nearly 'empty' release, however we have created the skeleton of the compendium and begun fleshing out the sections. Nevertheless any comments are welcome! And now some additional details: Scope : Large (IT) companies are particularly challenged by the quantity of licenses and their various versions. It is becoming quite expensive for each company to allocate and train employees as "Open Source License Experts" in order to ensure that the company acts according to those Open Source licenses touched by their projects. A better solution would be to have something like a "compendium" which lists all relevant usage scenarios, and offers for the major Open Source licenses something like a to-do list that describes what one has to do in order to fulfill the license conditions applicable to these usage scenarios. As far as we know such a reliable compendium doesn't exist at the moment. Following the spirit of Open Source Software, DTAG has published this compendium under the 'Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Germany' License and wants to follow the rule 'publish early, publish often' for developing this compendium together with the community. Not in scope : To be clear, it is not our task to describe all possible ways to fulfill a license. Particularly we do not want to discuss special cases and the ways of specific companies. This must remain the tasks of lawyers and state specific experts. Instead of this we want to offer one reliable way for each Open Source use case and each Open Source License to act according to the requirements. We want to find something like the traffic rule of thumb: Stay at red light, drive at green light (and let the other experts discuss whether it might be allowed to drive through yellow in this case - or if in this specific case the color is not red, but still very dark yellow.) Happy Coding (for (re)activating a famous salutation) Karsten Reincke, John Dobson,  Greg Sharpe, Peter Schichl, Michael Kern --- Deutsche Telekom AG Products &amp; Innovation Karsten Reincke, PMP® Fach-Senior Manager T&amp;P/A&amp;S/TM T-Online-Allee 1 64295 Darmstadt Tel.: +49 6151 680 - 8941 Fax.: +49 6151 680 - 2529 E-Mail k.reincke&lt; at &gt;telekom.de http://www.telekom.de/ Erleben, was verbindet. Deutsche Telekom AG Aufsichtsrat: Prof. Dr. Ulrich Lehner (Vorsitzender) Vorstand: René Obermann (Vorsitzender), Dr. Manfred Balz, Reinhard Clemens, Niek Jan van Damme, Timotheus Höttges, Claudia Nemat, Thomas Sattelberger Handelsregister: Amtsgericht Bonn HRB 6794 Sitz der Gesellschaft: Bonn WEEE-Reg.-Nr.: DE50478376 Große Veränderungen fangen klein an - Ressourcen schonen und nicht jede E-Mail drucken. Hinweis: Diese E-Mail und / oder die Anhänge ist / sind vertraulich und ausschließlich für den bezeichneten Adressaten bestimmt. Jegliche Durchsicht, Weitergabe oder Kopieren dieser E-Mail ist strengstens verboten. Wenn Sie diese E-Mail irrtümlich erhalten haben, informieren Sie bitte unverzüglich den Absender und vernichten Sie die Nachricht und alle Anhänge. Vielen Dank. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Reincke, Karsten 2012-03-21T14:42:47 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12137 <pre>Hi. I tried maling FSFs licensing department, but the FSFs website says something to the effect that if they have answered the question on their webpage, the mail will be unanswered, and I have not received a reply. So I'm asuming it is answered on their website. However I cannot find the answer to this specific question, and Google is of no help. So I'm trying this list instead. I am packaging an old game I recently discovered, which is still in active development. The game (netrek-client-cow) have MIT or an MIT-like license (at least I think it's MIT), which have a "and without fee" clause. And I am unsure whether that this clause is compatible with Free Software or not. To someone like me, this looks like what we today call a no commercial clause. I have discovered that it most likely is what Fedora call MIT old style. (http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:MIT#Old_Style) So my question is, is this a Free Software license? There is two license text files, one is possibly newer that the other. At least one of the licence files seems to be from 1986, and the other from 1989. The license text in full reads: == 1 == Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies. ==== == 2 == Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software and its documentation for any purpose and without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies and that both that copyright notice and this permission notice appear in supporting documentation. No representations are made about the suitability of this software for any purpose. It is provided "as is" without express or implied warranty. ==== </pre> Johnny Solbu 2012-03-12T14:47:47 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/12013 <pre>Dear OSI Experts, Deutsche Telekom AG (DTAG) is writing an Open Source License Compendium, which we intend to be made available to the whole Open Source community. Large (IT) companies are particularily challenged by the quantity of licenses and their various versions. It is becoming quite expensive for each company to allocate and train employees as "Open Source License Experts" in order to ensure that the company acts according to those Open Source licenses touched by their projects. A better solution would be to have something like a "compendium" which lists all relevant usage scenarios, and offers for the major Open Source licenses something like a to-do list that describes what one has to do in order to fulfill the license conditions applicable to these usage scenarios. As far as we know such a reliable compendium doesn't exist at the moment. Following the spirit of Open Source Software, DTAG wants to publish this compendium under the license 'Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Germany'. Moreover, DTAG intends to host the sources of this compendium on github: we want to follow the rule 'publish early, publish often', and to develop this compendium together with the community. As this compendium will serve the Open Source community, and also perhaps help the Open Source Initiative achieve its goals of promoting open source usage and bridging the gaps between producers and consumers of open source software, we would like adopt a logo that reflects this. As such, we are considering the attached logo, and would like to ask the Open Source Initiative if this would be acceptable to the organisation. We understand that 'Opensource.org site content is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License'. Hence, deriving something from the OSI logo can be achieved, and we naturally also want to respect the OSI Logo Usage Guidelines ( http://www.opensource.org/logo-usage-guidelines). Our proposed logo shall express that the OSLiC (Open Source License Compendium) shall act according to the spirit and intentions of the 'umbrella' Open Source Initiative We look forward to your feedback, and sincerely hope that the proposed logo is acceptable. Please let us know if this is the case. Best Regards K. Reincke, G. Sharpe, J. Dobson --- Deutsche Telekom AG Products &amp; Innovation Karsten Reincke, PMP® Fach-Senior Manager T&amp;P/A&amp;S/TM T-Online-Allee 1 64295 Darmstadt Tel.: +49 6151 680 - 8941 Fax.: +49 6151 680 - 2529 E-Mail k.reincke&lt; at &gt;telekom.de http://www.telekom.de/ Erleben, was verbindet. Deutsche Telekom AG Aufsichtsrat: Prof. Dr. Ulrich Lehner (Vorsitzender) Vorstand: René Obermann (Vorsitzender), Dr. Manfred Balz, Reinhard Clemens, Niek Jan van Damme, Timotheus Höttges, Claudia Nemat, Thomas Sattelberger Handelsregister: Amtsgericht Bonn HRB 6794 Sitz der Gesellschaft: Bonn WEEE-Reg.-Nr. DE50478376 Große Veränderungen fangen klein an - Ressourcen schonen und nicht jede E-Mail drucken. Hinweis: Diese E-Mail und / oder die Anhänge ist / sind vertraulich und ausschließlich für den bezeichneten Adressaten bestimmt. Jegliche Durchsicht, Weitergabe oder Kopieren dieser E-Mail ist strengstens verboten. Wenn Sie diese E-Mail irrtümlich erhalten haben, informieren Sie bitte unverzüglich den Absender und vernichten Sie die Nachricht und alle Anhänge. Vielen Dank._______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Reincke, Karsten 2012-02-21T15:09:57 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11991 <pre>Hi, Is there any particular reason why CDDL1.1 and GPL2 _with classpath exception_ are not approved by the OSI ? (i.e. http://glassfish.java.net/public/CDDL+GPL_1_1.html ) Thanks! -mathieu -------------------------------------------------------------------------- NOTICE: Morgan Stanley is not acting as a municipal advisor and the opinions or views contained herein are not intended to be, and do not constitute, advice within the meaning of Section 975 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. If you have received this communication in error, please destroy all electronic and paper copies and notify the sender immediately. Mistransmission is not intended to waive confidentiality or privilege. Morgan Stanley reserves the right, to the extent permitted under applicable law, to monitor electronic communications. This message is subject to terms available at the following link: http://www.morganstanley.com/disclaimers. If you cannot access these links, please notify us by reply message and we will send the contents to you. By mess aging with Morgan Stanley you consent to the foregoing. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Gervais, Mathieu 2012-02-01T20:23:09 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11976 <pre>Colleagues, I commend for your reading pleasure the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Golan v. Holder, 565 U. S. ____ (2012), which holds broadly that Congress can restore the copyrights of works previously in the public domain in order to conform to the requirements of the Berne Convention. See http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/10-545.pdf and 17 U.S.C. 104A &lt;http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000104---A000- .html&gt; . This 6-2 decision was written by the court's copyright expert, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. It relies heavily on the court's earlier decision in Eldred v. Ashcroft, which some of you may remember from a few years ago and which affirmed Congressional power to extend copyright terms. Besides being a well-written summary of the purposes of copyright and the balance struck by copyright law, the Golan decision emphasizes again for us that the public domain isn't quite as safe as licenses. /Larry Lawrence Rosen Rosenlaw &amp; Einschlag, a technology law firm (www.rosenlaw.com) 3001 King Ranch Road, Ukiah, CA 95482 _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Lawrence Rosen 2012-01-23T04:35:00 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11967 <pre>Good Morning! Our company is releasing a medical informatics platform, RexDB, under the GPLv3 license later this year (after the code has a developer documentation). We will be using 7b clause of the GPLv3 license for a reasonable author attribution. Even so, parts of our system will be released under a more permissive license, and I'm wondering if there is a simple, MIT-style clause that would be compatible with the GPLv3? Here's my crayon attempt... To the extent that an application using this software displays legal notices, copyrights, or attributions it must acknowledge the Example Project (http://example.org) in a similar manner. Would this sort of clause be compatible with GPLv3 and would it meet the OSI criteria? Would anyone have specific wording suggestions? I'm asking here because I'd rather re-use something similar, if not, then I'd prefer to be adding a clause that has "consensus" here. Thank you kindly. Clark _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Clark C. Evans 2012-01-14T13:58:34 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11950 <pre>Hi, Is it permitted to have a program licensed under GPLv3 and an EPL software in one binary distribution? There is no share of source code ore use of a library. The GPL binary executes the EPL binary as an external process (as a command line tool). I interpret that as an aggregate: A compilation of a covered work with other separate and independent works, which are not by their nature extensions of the covered work, and which are not combined with it such as to form a larger program, in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium, is called an "aggregate" if the compilation and its resulting copyright are not used to limit the access or legal rights of the compilation's users beyond what the individual works permit. Inclusion of a covered work in an aggregate does not cause this License to apply to the other parts of the aggregate. Am I right or not? Thanks Mike_______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Mike Steglich 2012-01-12T15:59:23 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11945 <pre>Hi! I am a member of the Tiki Wiki CMS Groupware Community. In Tiki, we include quite a few libraries: http://dev.tiki.org/External+Libraries I am also working on "Tiki Suite", a dozen FOSS server and desktop apps to cover what 80% of the people use 80% of the time for a typical small or medium organization. -&gt; http://suite.tiki.org/ So I invest a lot of time evaluating FOSS projects and license compatibility is important. I am also concerned with license proliferation in general, as a barrier for sharing code. I occasionally notice projects which add clauses such as this one http://projects.opensource.org/pipermail/license-discuss/2011-November/000025.html Here are three more: a) AskoziaPBX is BSD with an extra clause http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AskoziaPBX http://www.askozia.com/pbx-license/ b) Roundcube intends to move to GPLv3+ with an exception: http://lists.roundcube.net/mail-archive/announce/2011-12/0000002.html c) sipXecs is AGPL and there are some additional clauses, including "By using the sipXecs solution you agree that SIPfoundry can use your name and logo to identify you as a user of the sipXecs solution" http://www.sipfoundry.org/licensing 1- Do these examples above respect the Free Software and/or Open Source definitions? (If not, can you specify what is not respecting) Of course, they are free to use whatever license they want. However, in some cases, calling it "Open Source" or "Free Software" can be misleading. 2- If not, what is done / can be done about this? a) Contacting the project to discuss with them and try to find a solution. b) Contacting Open Source directories such as Ohloh.net and getting the project entries removed. I already started a discussion (please join in!) https://www.ohloh.net/forums/8/topics/7228 c) Correcting the Wikipedia entries d) Other? (Maintain a list of projects which claim to be Open Source but that their license is not according to experts at OSI) What do you think? Best regards, </pre> Marc Laporte 2011-12-29T01:51:54 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11890 <pre> Is there a full/formal list of those abbreviations somewhere? Would be useful to be able to point at. Thanks! Luis _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Luis Villa 2011-12-21T20:56:28 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11873 <pre>I have a broad question about various interpretations of the GPL with regard to WebAPIs. Let me start with an example scenario. 1. Suppose that Super Visual is a clever GPL licensed data visualization program (released by Vendor A). 2. Now suppose that there is a closed-source, but free to redistribute, data processing library, called Correlate (by Vendor B), which takes a data set and a parameters and does a clever and very proprietary data transformation. 3. Now suppose that I modify Super Visual to incorporate the functionality of Correlate. It works wonderfully and I wish to share my Visual Correlate with my friend. Is this permitted by the GPL? a. Suppose my modifications involve static libraries, the resulting Visual Correlate is a single compiled executable. b. Suppose Super Visual has a plugin mechanism, and I use this internal API to load Correlate as a dynamic link library. Let's assume I also ensure that the program still works but lacks the correlate functionality if the dynamic library isn't there. I don't ship correlate.dll, but tell my friend about the easter egg. c. Suppose that Super Visual doesn't have a plugin system, but I release a GPL licensed Super Visual /w Plugins that does. Now can I release Visual Correlate using this plugin mechanism? d. Suppose that I make a SuperVisual+ (GPL licensed) with "generic", if complex way, to invoke separate executables for external processing using standard input, output, and command line arguments. Suppose also I get permission from vendor B to create and freely distribute a closed source Correlate command line executable that takes the specially formatted inputs to return outputs that the SuperVisual+ needs. I'm all clear now? e. Suppose that I instead wrap Correlate in a WebAPI (let's say I get permission of Vendor B to do this). Then, my modification to SuperVisual creates a runtime dependency on the web service; it degrades nicely without Correlate functionality if you lack a network connection or haven't paid to access my web service. Can I release this Visual Correlate under the GPL? f. Suppose that SuperVisual is a web application, and I "wrap" it with a web service running on a different server (without modifying one line of code), parsing the output stream to add additional functionality provided by Correlate. The final result is that my users experience a single integrated application that mixes both Correlate and Super Visual functionality. My interpretation of the GPL is that in every case, I'd be producing a modified version. Even in the latter case, my wrapper would be using very specific (and hence intimate) information about how the application works and therefore would qualify as a new program based on the earlier work. Hence, since my Visual Correlate must comply with the GPL; and since I don't have the right to also release Correlate under the GPL, I can't share my work (as cool as it may be) with my friend -- even if he already has a copy of the Correlate program. I say this for a few reasons. First, in section #1 of the GPL, "Corresponding Source" it says that the corresponding source must include all source code needed to run the object code. Hence, I must also include Correlate under the GPL. Secondly, under section #5c, it requires that I license the "whole of the work, and all its parts, regardless how they are packaged". Hence, my attempts to work around the intent of the license are foiled... packaging the Correlate function as a WebAPI doesn't make it any less of the whole work. Is this a correct assessment? If not, where has my logic gone astray? I've talked to a few attorneys lately about this situation, and I've gotten wildly different answers. While the specific example is completely hypothetical, the general situation isn't. I'd remark that it's widely held that wrapping up proprietary functionality in a Web API is a valid way to evade the GPL's copyleft. http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4351119/if-i-use-gnu-gpl-code-with-my-own-server-side-code-do-i-need-to-open-my-server/ Best, Clark _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Clark C. Evans 2011-12-20T16:55:30 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11863 <pre>Tentative title: Are 69 Open Source Licenses Enough? My questions: Do we really need that many open source licenses? Is there any way to consolidate some of them, which would make life simpler for a whole lot of people? Or does each one of these licenses serve an essential purpose for someone (or some company)? License-Discuss list traffic has died down a lot over the last two - three year. Why? You can answer me off-list or we can set up a time to talk between Tuesday and Friday. The article will run at: http://olex.openlogic.com/wazi/ Thanks in advance, - - Robin </pre> Robin 'Roblimo' Miller 2011-12-19T15:22:58 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11849 <pre>I'd love your high-level thoughts on a "Free Island" license or anything that might be similar in nature. ... FREE ISLAND PUBLIC LICENSE (v0.2 on 12 DEC 2011) This software is licensed for any purpose excepting the right to make publicly available derived works which depend exclusively upon non-free components. So long as this copyright and license are included in all substantial copies of this work you may: 1. Publicly copy and use verbatim copies of this work including public distribution and performance. 2. Privately deal with this work in any way you wish, including internal usage, copying, and modification of this work. You may also make publicly available via distribution or public performance any Derived Work only if the following conditions are met: 1. the preferred source code for the Derived Work must be made freely available under this license; 2. the Derived Work must pass the Free Island test. By "Derived Work" we mean a modified copy or adaptation of this work or a separate work such as a plug-in, protocol adapter, or wrapper which is designed to have intimate interactions with this work's operational details, or interfaces. A Derived Work passes the "Free Island" test if it could be prepared, modified, compiled, tested, installed, and operated in a manner advertised or expected using only Commodity Hardware, Free Software, this software, and the Derived Work itself. In particular, the Derived Work fails this test if it depends upon proprietary software, remote services or hardware to provide features that do not have a corresponding Free Software implementation. By Free Software we mean any software which is readily available to the public without fee and with this license, any license approved by the Open Source Initiative or any license considered free by the Free Software Foundation. By Commodity Hardware we mean a computing device which has substitutes in a marketplace and is priced under fair, reasonable and non-discriminatory terms (FRAND). A safe harbor for passing the Free Island test is if the Derived Work is fully usable as intended when compiled &amp; installed on a set of networked Debian virtual machines using software only from its 'free' distribution, the KVM emulator, and no outside network connectivity. If the work is created for the purposes of interfacing with proprietary hardware or services, then a sufficiently complete emulation of those components must be made available as Free Software. THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, AGAINST INFRINGEMENT, TITLE AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Clark C. Evans 2011-12-12T18:45:28 http://comments.gmane.org/gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general/11848 <pre>Now that I've sent out the MPL, I'll raise again the question of four MPL-derived licenses that appear to belong in the "licenses that have been voluntarily retired" list. [Originally raised in Jan. 2010 and again in Mar. 2011.] * CUA Office license: as of Jan. 2010, their website[1] said that the project was dissolved and they had requested that the license be 'withdrawn from the OSI list'. Since Jan. 2010 their website has apparently been whittled down as part of the recent SF reorg, and this text can no longer be found. * Sun Public License v 1.0: Simon says this is officially retired; in Jan. 2010 he cited this blog post in support of that claim, but it only references SISSL: http://blogs.sun.com/webmink/entry/addressing_proliferation_deeds_not_just * CA TOSL: can no longer find essentially any references to this on the CA website[2]; appears to have been written to cover the official source release of Ingres in 2004[3], but Ingres has since moved to GPL[4]. Not sure this counts as voluntarily retired, per se, but does seem to have basically vanished off the net (other than the OSI website.) Russ said in March he'd asked a contact about it; any news? * Ricoh Public Source License: can't find any references to this on the ricoh website, and the site and projects it was originally intended to work with (risource.org) appears to be AWOL, and as best as I can tell no one distributes any code under this license. Same as above: maybe not voluntarily retired, but basically vanished from the net other than OSI. Russ said in March he'd asked a contact about it; any news? Luis [1] http://sourceforge.net/projects/cuaoffice/ [2] http://www.google.com/search?q="trusted+open+source+license"+site%3Aca.com &lt;- first hit there doesn't actually contain the text; second hit is a slide deck; third deck is historical information. [3] http://investor.ca.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=315670 [4] http://www.ingres.com/about/licenses/ingres-license.php _______________________________________________ License-discuss mailing list License-discuss&lt; at &gt;opensource.org http://projects.opensource.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/license-discuss </pre> Luis Villa 2011-12-09T15:08:19 Search the mailing list at Gmane query http://search.gmane.org/?group=$group=gmane.comp.licenses.open-source.general