Re: [PECL-DEV] Re: Re: [PHP-QA] Debian and the PHP license
On Wed, Jul 30, 2014 at 1:07 PM, Thorsten Glaser t...@debian.org wrote: Pierre Joye wrote: As Rasmus, and I, said numerous times, the PHP License is a perfectly valid choice as long as the software are distributed under *.php.net. This reading clearly fails DFSG#3 and OSD#3 at the very least, and makes *all* software using the PHP Licence non-free, because redistribution of derived works is only permitted from *.php.net which is clearly inaccep- table. This makes not just forking the software impossible but also dis- tribution of binaries made from modified sources, for example. This is a wrong interpretation. The releases are/must be distributed under *.php.net to be able to use the PHP License. It means that one reading the license after having installed php using apt-get php5 will find all software installed with php5. There is nothing wrong here and nothing about the location of the software release is against Free Software. The incompatibility between Free Software's GPL and the PHP license is only due to the naming restriction and nothing else. Cheers, -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/CAEZPtU5aXtMHv6o4V5Fw=o-yh77Pd0pDd=o5bbnccrqn62o...@mail.gmail.com
Re: [PECL-DEV] Re: [PHP-QA] Debian and the PHP license
On Wed, Jul 30, 2014 at 1:47 PM, Thorsten Glaser t...@debian.org wrote: On the other hand, my own reading of the PHP Licence is that we may not, in fact, distribute (binaries of) modified versions of PHP software (the interpreter as well as everything else under that licence), period - but that distributing the original source alongside patches is okay (e.g. as 3.0 (quilt) source package). Since Debian isn't distributing source pak- kages, this does not help us. A written permission from gr...@php.net is not helpful either, because of DFSG#8. Good point. (I think you're referring to section 4; correct me if I'm Right. wrong.) This would make PHP-licensed software *with PHP in the title* non-free until rebranded, like firefox was until rebranded to iceweasel. Indeed. And seeing this, I think that Debian may ship neither the PHP interpreter nor anything else under PHP licence without doing a rebranding. This would not, however, make the license non-free, it would just make for some annoying rebranding, which should be much more manageable. It would, however, make the licence inacceptable for Debian for anything bearing PHP in its name, which is kinda the point of the PHP licence. This is not what the license says. The license says you cannot create a derivative project and use PHP in its name. hhvm is a derivative work for example. Distributing php, even by back porting patches, is not a derivative work. Cheers, -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/CAEZPtU7iSD4faxeoti_1=icf-cfpqtfo6dza9ufvhohz9da...@mail.gmail.com
Re: [PECL-DEV] Re: [PHP-QA] Debian and the PHP license
hi Walter, On Tue, Jul 29, 2014 at 9:16 PM, Walter Landry wlan...@caltech.edu wrote: Ferenc Kovacs tyr...@gmail.com wrote: I've find it a bit disturbing, that ftpmasters can make a decision on legal grounds(which is the probably the highest priority for debian as far as I'm concerned), without any backing from debian-legal debian-legal has no authority to decide anything. It is just a mailing list. We can discuss things here day and night and ftp-masters can ignore it. With that said, debian-legal can be useful when issues are clear-cut. For example, if someone asks if the Apache 2.0 license is compatible with the GPL (no for GPL 2.0, yes for GPL 3.0). Think of debian-legal as the secretary for ftp-masters. We can sometimes divine what they are thinking, but the final word belongs to ftp-masters. In any case, in the interest of making this email constructive, my take on the PHP license is that it does need to be fixed. From ftp-masters REJECT-FAQ, they also think so. So my advice would be to just use a well known, existing license and be done with it. Judging from the existing PHP license, the closest thing would be the 3 clause BSD license http://opensource.org/licenses/BSD-3-Clause Apache 2.0 would also be a good choice. Now, I understand that changing licenses is a huge chore, and the benefits can sometimes be intangible. The main benefit is that you will never have to deal with us again ;) As Rasmus, and I, said numerous times, the PHP License is a perfectly valid choice as long as the software are distributed under *.php.net. I see this move as yet another attempt to force developers to abandon a totally valid license in the name of the Debian ideal, Free Softwares. I cannot blame anyone willing to reach this goal but as a matter of fact, there is no issue with the PHP license, not anymore since 3.01. And about dealing with Debian about that, well, Debian has actually more to lose than any other 3rd parties. Let focus on getting the web stack rocks on Debian instead. Cheers, -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/caezptu7yan3y_cht3sfgclrjrg07wg3yguhwzk1g0b86f9o...@mail.gmail.com
Re: [PECL-DEV] Debian request to change the PHP license for Extensions
On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 10:39 AM, Ulf Wendel ulf.wen...@phpdoc.de wrote: Am 27.06.2014 09:56, schrieb Ferenc Kovacs: I think they just consider our license troublesome for exts as it seems too specific for php-src, and they only want to avoid possible license infringement. Just keep the scope of any possible PHP license change in mind. You got one player, a consumer/redistributor, that developed a hiccup only recently. And, you have many, many other players that arranged themselves with todays PHP license over so many years. Licensing changes affect not only consumers but also all contributors. Any change would make literally hundrets of legal departement happy and evaluate your ideas. Those legal departements begin their analysis on a blank sheet of paper. They will not bother much, if at all, about the input you got from your legal advisor. In a perfect world, you could do some tiny text changes to the license without much hassle. In reality, this is a monster topic. Any rush can cause massive harm. Amen. And it cannot be done without asking every single contributor. Let say it is an impossible task at this point, or very very hard. -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/caezptu4xvzuomp0+tevt481erpyjpkh-qa29amp60oks3qy...@mail.gmail.com
Re: [PECL-DEV] Debian request to change the PHP license for Extensions
On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 11:28 AM, Pierre Joye pierre@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 10:39 AM, Ulf Wendel ulf.wen...@phpdoc.de wrote: Am 27.06.2014 09:56, schrieb Ferenc Kovacs: I think they just consider our license troublesome for exts as it seems too specific for php-src, and they only want to avoid possible license infringement. Just keep the scope of any possible PHP license change in mind. You got one player, a consumer/redistributor, that developed a hiccup only recently. And, you have many, many other players that arranged themselves with todays PHP license over so many years. Licensing changes affect not only consumers but also all contributors. Any change would make literally hundrets of legal departement happy and evaluate your ideas. Those legal departements begin their analysis on a blank sheet of paper. They will not bother much, if at all, about the input you got from your legal advisor. In a perfect world, you could do some tiny text changes to the license without much hassle. In reality, this is a monster topic. Any rush can cause massive harm. Amen. And it cannot be done without asking every single contributor. Let say it is an impossible task at this point, or very very hard. Keeping in mind that the only actual issue we had in the PHP License was fixed in 3.01. -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/CAEZPtU76cCn=oiwrs-mqndx6aiq-u-egezzfawva_p-f8ax...@mail.gmail.com
Re: [PECL-DEV] Debian request to change the PHP license for Extensions
On Jun 27, 2014 12:00 PM, Ferenc Kovacs tyr...@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 11:28 AM, Pierre Joye pierre@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 11:28 AM, Pierre Joye pierre@gmail.com wrote: On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 10:39 AM, Ulf Wendel ulf.wen...@phpdoc.de wrote: Am 27.06.2014 09:56, schrieb Ferenc Kovacs: I think they just consider our license troublesome for exts as it seems too specific for php-src, and they only want to avoid possible license infringement. Just keep the scope of any possible PHP license change in mind. You got one player, a consumer/redistributor, that developed a hiccup only recently. And, you have many, many other players that arranged themselves with todays PHP license over so many years. Licensing changes affect not only consumers but also all contributors. Any change would make literally hundrets of legal departement happy and evaluate your ideas. Those legal departements begin their analysis on a blank sheet of paper. They will not bother much, if at all, about the input you got from your legal advisor. In a perfect world, you could do some tiny text changes to the license without much hassle. In reality, this is a monster topic. Any rush can cause massive harm. Amen. And it cannot be done without asking every single contributor. Let say it is an impossible task at this point, or very very hard. Keeping in mind that the only actual issue we had in the PHP License was fixed in 3.01. The existance of 3.01 means that it is possible to update our license (of course other projects are free to stick to an older one if they want as described in clause 5). I don't want to rush things, I'm just saying that maybe we should consider revisiting/rewording our current license to make it more clear regarding the usage for extensions and stuff. When comparing http://www.php.net/license/3_0.txt with http://www.php.net/license/3_01.txt I can see that clause 6 was changed from 6. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following acknowledgment: This product includes PHP, freely available from http://www.php.net/. to 6. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following acknowledgment: This product includes PHP software, freely available from http://www.php.net/software/. Which is still confusing imo. One interpretation is that we consider the exts as derived work, and this is what we are referring to as includes, but it could be also interpreted, that this project is a php software, distributed through http://www.php.net/software/ implying that you can't use the license if you aren't distributing your software there. And to tell you the truth, I have never seen this possible interpretation before you mentioned this restriction today. It is clearly defined in the license. I am not sure how it could be more clear without adding more confusion. Discussions were also very clear and constructive back then. That's why I really do not understand what debian wants now.
Re: [PECL-DEV] Debian request to change the PHP license for Extensions
On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 1:13 PM, Ulf Wendel ulf.wen...@phpdoc.de wrote: I perceive this reply as both sarcastic and agressive. Any particular reason bashing someone doing nothing but asking not to rush? It is certainly due to the language differences but there was nothing sarcastic nor aggressive in my reply. So let me try to rephrase it. Amen. It means: I cannot agree more with you here. And it cannot be done without asking every single contributor. Let say it is an impossible task at this point, or very very hard. Even if we would like to rush, we can't, because we have to ask much more people now that we did back then. The changes proposed by Debian (what Ferenc proposed here) are also much more important than some links changes, like what we did for 3.01. Cheers, -- Pierre @pierrejoye | http://www.libgd.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-legal-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: https://lists.debian.org/CAEZPtU40AD5L=qy5uppngypen9whmgqp8lgrudtzfdecf3d...@mail.gmail.com
Re: Clarification regarding PHP License and DFSG status
On 12/28/05, Charles Fry [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Pierre, There has been some ongoing discussion about the new PHP License on debian-legal, which you can read at: http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/12/threads.html#00025 To summarize, there are still concerns that certain clauses remain problematic, especially clauses 3 and 4: 3. The name PHP must not be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without prior written permission. For written permission, please contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] 4. Products derived from this software may not be called PHP, nor may PHP appear in their name, without prior written permission from [EMAIL PROTECTED] You may indicate that your software works in conjunction with PHP by saying Foo for PHP instead of calling it PHP Foo or phpfoo While you may not fully agree with some of the specific threads above, it should be clear that it is a big stretch to apply clauses 3 and 4 to software other than PHP itself. Given this, I would like to once again suggest that the Pear Group consider removing the PHP License from their list of accepted licenses. As previously discussed, existing projects may take time to be relicensed, but I see no reason to allow new Pear projects to use the PHP License (which developers may blindly accept as the PHP default). We can only recommand to do not use it for pear. If you have strong feelings to the contrary, I would be most interested in hearing them. My hope is that in the long term we will be able to come to a solution that allows Debian to freely distribute the bulk of the Pear projects. But I somehow miss the point here, as all softwares using the PHP License will only be available through php.net, the legal issues having been solved, what is the current stopping point? Besides these clauses, they were already reported as non free but in no way illegal. I mean it is the reason why PHP is not GPL compatible but it does not make the PHP license illegal, or useless for packages available under the php.net umbrella. Or am I missing something? --Pierre
