On Tue, Apr 08, 2008 at 11:36:01PM +0100, Simon Ward wrote: > On Tue, Apr 08, 2008 at 09:55:56PM +0100, Chris Croughton wrote: > > As far as I see it Free Software is a subset of Open Source. It can't > > be free (in the sense of freedom) unless the source is open, but it is > > possible for the source to be open but not free (because of restrictive > > licences). > > Free software is a subset of software that has source code available > (source available), as that is a pre???requisite for the software being > free according to the free software definition. However, ???open source??? > is merely a marketing term for free software. The open source > definition is mostly derived from the free software definition.
Slight Nit to pick here. The Open Source Definition is very directly derived from the Debian Free Software Guidelines (it's pretty much the same document with the word Debian removed in several places). The Debian Free Software Guidelines are a set of rules for measuring licensing terms to see if they are free enough. They were always supposed to come up with the same set of software as they FSF's Four Freedoms, but take a lot less depth of understanding to apply. Of course, you then have FSF interpreting their rules, Debian interpreting their Guidelines (with a pinch of salt, since some license might strictly speaking be free, but such a pain in the arse to comply with that the FTP-masters reject them on practical grounds) and the OSI treating those guidelines as though they were the US constitution, and getting all lawyerly about it. That's where the differences come from, the interpretation by individuals, but it's all the same thing really, and the corner cases are really not worth spending too much time on. Personally, if the FSF, Debian, and OSI[1] don't like it, I avoid using it, and would certainly not pass it on to my customers. Cheers, Phil. [1] Actually, I mostly ignore the OSI, but if you can point to something that they don't like that FSF and Debian do like, then I'll consider not using it. _______________________________________________ Fsfe-uk mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/fsfe-uk
