Date: Tue, 9 Feb 1999 00:45:24 +0000 (GMT) From: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> To: jkh@zippy.cdrom.com (Jordan K. Hubbard) Cc: brett@lariat.org, licia@o-o.org, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: GPL *again* (was: New CODA release) Message-ID: <199902090045.RAA04714@usr06.primenet.com> In-Reply-To: <2620.918495440@zippy.cdrom.com> from "Jordan K. Hubbard" at Feb 8, 99 09:37:20 am
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> > It's simple. I recommend the 2-clause Berkeley license with the following
> > additional clause:
> >
> > Neither this code, nor any derivative work based on this code, may be
> > published under a license that conditions its use upon the publication
> > of source code.
>
> No offense, but this is unwise. Either you're for absolute freedom of
> movement or you're against it, and the whole beauty of the 2 clause
> BSD license is that it's simple and specifically does NOT attempt to
> place undue restrictions upon reuse. That last paragraph there is
> very legally ambiguous ("publication" is a very loose term which any
> lawyer could make legal hash out of) and only obfuscates the license
> for what is probably zero legal gain. I honestly do not and cannot
> recommend that anyone use a license other than the 2 clause Berkeley
> license, unmodified and unmolested in any way. Its very simplicity is
> a precise and deliberate part of its attractiveness in the first
> place. Start mucking with it and the GPL, with all its good
> intentions and mountains of legaese, is the next stop in the road.
The ability to add a GPL-type viral clause to BSD licensed code
is precisely why FreeBSD has not updated it's version of dbm:
See:
http://www.sleepycat.com/license.net
Here is the relevent piece:
* Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
* modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
* are met:
* 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
* 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
* notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
* documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
* 3. Redistributions in any form must be accompanied by information on
* how to obtain complete source code for the DB software and any
* accompanying software that uses the DB software. The source code
* must either be included in the distribution or be available for no
* more than the cost of distribution plus a nominal fee, and must be
* freely redistributable under reasonable conditions. For an
* executable file, complete source code means the source code for all
* modules it contains. It does not mean source code for modules or
* files that typically accompany the operating system on which the
* executable file runs, e.g., standard library modules or system
* header files.
In other words, it's the GPL's "no other restrictions clause" that
keeps BSD licensed code from being virulized, not anything inherent
in the act of virulization, or an inherent conflict with the BSD license.
Terry Lambert
terry@lambert.org
---
Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present
or previous employers.
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