[GRASS-dev] is this license GPL2 compatible?

GRASS GRASS developer
1

[sorry for the cross-posting, I'm casting the idea net wide]

is this license GPL2 compatible?
is this license DFSG compatible? *

"There is no warranty whatsoever. Use at your own risk.

This code may be freely redistributed under the condition that the copyright
notices are not removed. You may distribute modified versions of this code
UNDER THE CONDITION THAT THIS CODE AND ANY MODIFICATIONS MADE TO IT IN THE
SAME FILE REMAIN UNDER COPYRIGHT OF FOOCORP, BOTH SOURCE AND OBJECT CODE ARE
MADE FREELY AVAILABLE WITHOUT CHARGE, AND CLEAR NOTICE IS GIVEN OF THE
MODIFICATIONS."

the bit I am concerned about is the effect of "all your modifications are
copyright us". (which is fine with me, but is it fine with the GPL?)

I seem to recall seeing something very similar in the past, is this a known
standard BSD/MIT/X variant?

[*] http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
    My attitude is that if it passes those tests, I/we can integrate
    it into our project without much worry.

?

thanks,
Hamish

2

On Wed, Sep 24, 2008 at 08:17:00PM +1200, Hamish wrote:

[sorry for the cross-posting, I'm casting the idea net wide]

is this license GPL2 compatible?
is this license DFSG compatible? *

No to both.

"There is no warranty whatsoever. Use at your own risk.

This code may be freely redistributed under the condition that the copyright
notices are not removed. You may distribute modified versions of this code
UNDER THE CONDITION THAT THIS CODE AND ANY MODIFICATIONS MADE TO IT IN THE
SAME FILE REMAIN UNDER COPYRIGHT OF FOOCORP, BOTH SOURCE AND OBJECT CODE ARE
MADE FREELY AVAILABLE WITHOUT CHARGE, AND CLEAR NOTICE IS GIVEN OF THE
MODIFICATIONS."

the bit I am concerned about is the effect of "all your modifications are
copyright us". (which is fine with me, but is it fine with the GPL?)

GPL does not deal with the copyright ownership. Indeed some companies/foundations
require that the owner of the code yields ownership to them in order to include
contribution, but that is not enforced in the license per se. See for instance
how many MySql patches are maintained off mainstream due to that: developers
of those patches are not inclined to assign copyright to MySQL AB, that does
not imply they cannot distribute autonomously their derivative work.

I seem to recall seeing something very similar in the past, is this a known
standard BSD/MIT/X variant?

No, the old BSD clause was about _citation_ of the copyright older
in derivative/including works. I seriously doubt that could even
be considered for non-free due to limitation on distribution.

--
Francesco P. Lovergine

3

On Wed, 24 Sep 2008, Hamish wrote:

[sorry for the cross-posting, I'm casting the idea net wide]

is this license GPL2 compatible?
is this license DFSG compatible? *

"There is no warranty whatsoever. Use at your own risk.

This code may be freely redistributed under the condition that the copyright
notices are not removed. You may distribute modified versions of this code
UNDER THE CONDITION THAT THIS CODE AND ANY MODIFICATIONS MADE TO IT IN THE
SAME FILE REMAIN UNDER COPYRIGHT OF FOOCORP, BOTH SOURCE AND OBJECT CODE ARE
MADE FREELY AVAILABLE WITHOUT CHARGE, AND CLEAR NOTICE IS GIVEN OF THE
MODIFICATIONS."

the bit I am concerned about is the effect of "all your modifications are
copyright us". (which is fine with me, but is it fine with the GPL?)

Perhaps they are trying to say that someone can't just make a few trivial changes and then claim copyright on the whole code. If someone adds a substantial new section I can't see how the copyright would "remain" with the original authors - the person who added the new bits would hold the copyright by default and if it was going to belong to anyone else it would need to be explicitly assigned. And this could be easily worked around by adding any new bit to a new file.

I'd be more concerned though about the requirement to make source and object code freely available without charge. That seems to conflict with the fact the the GPL allows people to sell software released under it. It even allows charging a nominal fee to distribute the source code IIRC. So I think that would be the main conflicting issue and the copyright one seems more to me a question of poor wording.

Just my opinion though

Paul

4

Hamish wrote:

[sorry for the cross-posting, I'm casting the idea net wide]

is this license GPL2 compatible?

IMHO, no.

is this license DFSG compatible? *

No idea.

"There is no warranty whatsoever. Use at your own risk.

This code may be freely redistributed under the condition that the copyright
notices are not removed. You may distribute modified versions of this code
UNDER THE CONDITION THAT THIS CODE AND ANY MODIFICATIONS MADE TO IT IN THE
SAME FILE REMAIN UNDER COPYRIGHT OF FOOCORP, BOTH SOURCE AND OBJECT CODE ARE
MADE FREELY AVAILABLE WITHOUT CHARGE, AND CLEAR NOTICE IS GIVEN OF THE
MODIFICATIONS."

the bit I am concerned about is the effect of "all your modifications are
copyright us". (which is fine with me, but is it fine with the GPL?)

I can't see how it can be.

The GPL requires that all derivative works are licensed under the GPL.
A licence is only "compatible" with the GPL if any terms and
conditions which it imposes are a subset of those imposed by the GPL,
so that, by complying with the GPL, you automatically comply with all
of the terms of the original licence.

Of course, you're free to do whatever you wish with code which you
write yourself. However, note that they aren't just asking for a
licence to your code, but transfer of the copyright. You couldn't
subsequently grant anyone else a licence to that code, as you no
longer own it.

GPL compatibility doesn't matter when it comes to your own code. It
matters if you want to merge the code with someone else's GPL'd code,
in which case you're in no position to transfer ownership of that
code, or even re-license it under terms other than the GPL.

Also, as Paul points out, the "without charge" is problematic.

--
Glynn Clements <glynn@gclements.plus.com>