> Actually, Gerv, they're not required to. Section VI of the NPL:
>
> IV. Inability to Comply Due to Contractual Obligation.
> Prior to licensing the Original Code under this License, Netscape has licensed
> third party code for use in Netscape's Branded Code. To the extent that Netscape
> is limited contractually from making such third party code available under this
> License, Netscape may choose to reintegrate such code into Covered Code without
> being required to distribute such code in Source Code form, even if such code
> would otherwise be considered ''Modifications'' under this License.
>
> And even though it's labeled for "Contractual Obligation", it's extremely easy
> to meet that criterion. How? Is there at least one Netscape developer who is not
> an employee, but a sub contractor? If so, anything they touch can be thrown in
> under this heading.
That wouldn't work. The above clause only applies to "third party code"
(i.e. code not produced by Netscape) licensed by Netscape _before_
licensing the Original code, ("Prior to licensing...") i.e. 31st March
1998. It is allowed to reintegrate any such non-Netscape code into NPLed
(note: not MPLed) files if it wishes to. It may also only keep it secret
"to the extend it is required to contractually" - i.e. they can't keep it
back just because they want to.
This clause now has very little worth indeed because of the amount of
MPLed code in the Mozilla codebase, and the unlikelihood of Netscape
having licensed code three years ago which is still useful to it today.
> Further, Section V clearly states that they may choose to distribute the source
> or not, their choice. Specifically, and the most powerful section, is as
> follows:
(You accept V.2 is now null and void, right?)
> V.3. Alternative Licensing.
> Netscape may license the Source Code of Netscape's Branded Code, including
> Modifications incorporated therein, without such Netscape Branded Code becoming
> subject to the terms of this License, and may license such Netscape Branded Code
> on different terms from those contained in this License.
>
> Right there. This is their out as far as the NPL/MPL goes, and even allows them
> to relicense code that they've worked with to 3rd parties, so the 3rd party can
> create a product without releasing the source. They can't do that with MPL code,
> so they'd need to license Netscape Branded Code (aka Netscape 6.x) to be
> released of this obligation.
Netscape 6.x is not "Netscape Branded Code" in its entirety - only the
bits under the NPL are. So yes, any parts of Mozilla still under the NPL
could be licensed to others by Netscape, modified and made proprietary -
but I doubt very much whether there is now any bit of Mozilla big enough
to be worth trying this with that has no MPL code in it whatsoever. Also,
this does not apply to Netscape itself, but only its licensees (if there
are any.)
And remember, Netscape is the copyright holder of most of the code that
falls under this, and, as such, can do whatever it likes with it anyway,
NPL or no NPL. That's the same for stuff I write, or you write, for
Mozilla.
Going back to the beginning of this argument, even if Netscape could
theoretically only release the source to the MPLed bits of Netscape 6
(which I don't think is true, reading the license), do you have any idea
how much hassle it would be creating that tarball? :-)
Gerv
