At 07:52 30/10/00 -0500, you wrote:
>One possible solution is to modify the license terms. We could
>include with the GPL a statement that allows the use of ANY third
>party software linked to the EJB container system only through a
>Java API (e.g. JMX) that does not import code from the jBoss
>distribution. This clause could also allow the use of any Java API
>for any purpose (which would put to rest the "can Java code be
>GNU-licensed" issue).
The problem lies in how much of your system would have to be exempt.
Anything that links with a java extention must not be GPL. MBeans can not
be GPL. That means that cuts out a large chunk of your code immediately.
The security stuff with JAAS is not GPLable, nor is the extended db
connection pooling stuff, nor transaction etxtention, nor is some of the
other stuff.
Other stuff (like jndi) is questionably GPLable. Because you target for a
1.2 VM (where JNDI is an extention) you can not GPL it in that case but in
1.3 where it is part of the runtime it is okay.
Hell - I am not even sure that any class importing ejb package is GPLable.
So what does that leave ?
A minimal set of classes namely;
* logging
* metadata
* verifier
* some utility code
* some security code
So tell me again why you are "GPL" ing your code when a very small subset
is actually GPL and most of it is excepted. What are you protecting ? None
of the above (except some utility code) is likely to be "stolen" by other
projects because it is either not finished (verifier), not useful outside
framework (security/metadata) or implemented better through other less
restrictive licenses (logging).
>It is apparently an acceptable use of the GPL license to modify it
>with such a statement. An example--from the gnu web site--is the
>license of guile (http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/license-list.html).
yep.
>It seems that this would meet our goals of ensuring that modified
>code is returned to the community, and would address many of the
>concerns of people such as your company's clients.
Given the above - do you really think so ?
Cheers,
Pete
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