[nant-dev] Licensing of NAnt vs. NAntContrib
I wasn't sure whether to post this to the NAnt dev list or the NAntContrib dev list, so forgive the dupe posting. I am working on a library of tasks for NAnt and am looking to set up the licensing correctly so I can distribute it. I would prefer to release under the LGPL but I am under the impression that since NAnt is GPL, and my library necessarily references the NAnt binaries, I am *required* to release my library as GPL, if I choose to release it. However, looking at the NAntContrib source, it seems that it is released as LGPL. So how is that NAntContrib can be released as LGPL when it is linking to a GPL library (NAnt)? Can I release my library as LGPL or am I required to use GPL? Sorry if the answer is obvious; this is the first thing I've ever tried to release as open source. Thanks for ending my confusion, ~ Justin Kohlhepp - This SF.net email is sponsored by DB2 Express Download DB2 Express C - the FREE version of DB2 express and take control of your XML. No limits. Just data. Click to get it now. http://sourceforge.net/powerbar/db2/ ___ nant-developers mailing list nant-developers@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
[nant-dev] Licensing
Hello all, after browsing the developer list's archive for some discussions about licensing, I felt like contributing one or two thoughts. I hope nobody minds my entering the discussion, although I just started using nant, with no code contributions so far. 1) I feel that one major point was not mentioned in the licensing thread from last month: the GPL has two two major goals. one is obviously to make sure that free software stays free. the other one however seems to be to give the free software community an advantage over commercially licensed software. that of course is only possible by putting things in the way of anyone who wants to charge for their software. the following quote is from a discussion about whether to use GPL or LGPL: http://www.fsf.org/licenses/why-not-lgpl.html Proprietary software developers have the advantage of money; free software developers need to make advantages for each other. Using the ordinary GPL for a library gives free software developers an advantage over proprietary developers: a library that they can use, while proprietary developers cannot use it. without reading the fine print, this statement alone says to me: don't use the GPL if you don't share that intention. (or if you want your product to be an alternative to comercially available stuff, that's what the lesser GPL seems to be about.) it also says to me as a potential NAnt user: if you want to charge for your software *and* use NAnt, this product's license goes out of its way to make this harder. 2) another perspective I'd like to add: I understand the problem with producing tools for Nant (GUI designers etc.) and intergrating it woth other products (IDEs). we're not into tool-building, but I may still face the following problem: say I develop a project that has little to do with Nant, but I'd like to distribute Nant to use its functionality not only for building, but for installing too. (an idea I grabbed from the SDC sample on gotdotnet: http://www.gotdotnet.com/Community/UserSamples/Details.aspx?SampleGuid=2 CB20E79-D706-4706-9EA0-26188257EE7D ) NAnt may one day choose to add specific support for integrating .build file sections in MSI install scripts. However, AFAIU the GPL could be a major obstacle in using this stuff. (and switching licenses won't getting any easier, should you choose to do this at a later point.) I have no problem contributing whatever enhancements I might come up with, be it modificatiosn or new tasks. neither would my company. it makes my life easier, and it's just fair. however, if I get the feeling that the GPL could 'infect' my product just because it *uses* Nant (as opposed to extend), I'd have to drop it like a hot stone. 3) msbuild. it's going to take its time, but one day it will compete with Nant (and I believe there will be a need for NAnt even if msbuild is available). I imagine that the NAnt developers will be trying to make sure both are as compatible as possible - in both build files and custom tasks. choosing a too strict license could lead to a situation where custom tasks that could be available for NAnt will not. being msbuild compatible does not require source-disclosure, while being NAnt compatible would. We all know where the big market is going to be, so dropping NAnt support would not be a hard decision for some companies. without the licensing problems, adding it could be an even easier decision. 4) if some or all of my concerns should be invalid, it just goes two show how GPL fear works against Nant adoption. maybe some clear words on the project homepage from someone who really understands open source licensing could help then. I hope I'm not too negative on the GPL, and I'm no licensing expert either. just my two cents. Regards, Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. Does SourceForge.net help you be more productive? Does it help you create better code? SHARE THE LOVE, and help us help YOU! Click Here: http://sourceforge.net/donate/ ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
RE: [nant-dev] Licensing
IANAL If and when, Nant chooses to migrate to a different license, it will have to handle the copyrights of the contributers. Scott Hernandez and I briefly discussed this on the Draco.Net list. Scott wanted references, and I haven't responded because I had to take some time to look them up. Based on my research, I concluded the following: 1. NAnt is not a work for hire 2. Nant is a joint work 3. The implicit aggreement of joint work was the license then in effect. 4. Contributers own the copyright on their contributions. 5. Changing the implicit aggreement of joint work violates the contributers' copyright. 6. To change the implicit agreement, written consent is needed. REF general http://www.denniskennedy.com/opensourcelaw.htm http://www.fsf.org/licenses/license-list.html http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/enforcing-gpl.html http://www.openrevolt.org/ http://www.fsf.org/copyleft/gpl-faq.html http://www.fsf.org/copyleft/why-assign.html http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/index.html http://biz.findlaw.com/intellectual_property/articles.html http://www.findlaw.com/01topics/10cyberspace/licensing/publications.html http://profs.lp.findlaw.com/copyright/copyright_3.html http://www.findlaw.com/01topics/23intellectprop/01copyright/index.html /general software-copyright http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2000-all/hollander-2000-02-all.html http://www.fplc.edu/tfield/COPYSOF.htm http://www.netatty.com/copy.html http://profs.lp.findlaw.com/copyown/index.html /software-copyright ownership http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2000-all/landau-2000-04-all.html /ownership work-for-hire http://www.gigalw.com/articles/2000-all/loc-2000-02-all.html /work-for-hire commentary http://www.crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3:mss:5943:200210:pcddoaoajaglbhghpe oe http://www.crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3:mss:5928:200210:pcddoaoajaglbhghpe oe http://biz.findlaw.com/intellectual_property/nolo/ency/B09BB4E7-5744-4131-8B 29ACD7CC408853.html http://biz.findlaw.com/intellectual_property/nolo/faq/BABFA71E-97C9-479F-8A9 D4C3DB2498663.html http://profs.lp.findlaw.com/copyown/copyown_3.html http://profs.lp.findlaw.com/copyright/index.html http://www.crynwr.com/cgi-bin/ezmlm-cgi?3:mss:33:199904:mjebdegliikloobhagjp /commentary /REF Hope this Helps, -- Tom. /IANAL --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, Tom Jordan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IANAL If and when, Nant chooses to migrate to a different license, it will have to handle the copyrights of the contributers. IANAL either, but what you say is 100% the same that I've seen happen in similar cases for other projects. At least under US law, all OS contributors retain their copyright unless they've signed a license agreement or something similar. Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
Yes, this has always concerned me and is something I think we need to remedy on any future contributions. We need some kind of declaimer/license agreement that people submitting patches agree to. Then we can be free to make these kinds of changes without contacting a hundred people, or keeping track of each person who makes the smallest code change. For people who make small contributions (a few lines changed here or there) I'm sure they would be willing to hand over their copyright, whereas people who make large contributions should keep them. In a collaborative project like this it seems appropriate to have 5-15 (keeping the number small for manageability) copyright holders (who have made large contributions) who become the committee who decides license issues like this. Does anyone know if a scheme like this is possible and legal in the US? - Original Message - From: Stefan Bodewig [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, Tom Jordan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IANAL If and when, Nant chooses to migrate to a different license, it will have to handle the copyrights of the contributers. IANAL either, but what you say is 100% the same that I've seen happen in similar cases for other projects. At least under US law, all OS contributors retain their copyright unless they've signed a license agreement or something similar. --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
Isn't it common to assign copyright to on eor two people or some registered body ? So for apache projects its the apache foundation, for mono its Ximian etc I think at this stage we would have difficulty tracking down all contributers. Ian Scott Hernandez wrote: Yes, this has always concerned me and is something I think we need to remedy on any future contributions. We need some kind of declaimer/license agreement that people submitting patches agree to. Then we can be free to make these kinds of changes without contacting a hundred people, or keeping track of each person who makes the smallest code change. For people who make small contributions (a few lines changed here or there) I'm sure they would be willing to hand over their copyright, whereas people who make large contributions should keep them. In a collaborative project like this it seems appropriate to have 5-15 (keeping the number small for manageability) copyright holders (who have made large contributions) who become the committee who decides license issues like this. Does anyone know if a scheme like this is possible and legal in the US? - Original Message - From: Stefan Bodewig [EMAIL PROTECTED] On Tue, 14 Oct 2003, Tom Jordan [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IANAL If and when, Nant chooses to migrate to a different license, it will have to handle the copyrights of the contributers. IANAL either, but what you say is 100% the same that I've seen happen in similar cases for other projects. At least under US law, all OS contributors retain their copyright unless they've signed a license agreement or something similar. --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Fri, 10 Oct 2003, Matthew Mastracci [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: My largest concern is not that a company can use BSD-code, but rather add core enhancements (ie: modifications/enhancements/bug fixes to the core code) and keep those proprietary. Yes, there is nothing inside a BSDish license that would prohibit that. Say my project X is under a BSDish license and company Y adds a feature and sells the modified version as X enhanced (they can under BSD, but not under Apache style). What will happen when I add a new feature to X and make a new release? Some options: * Users of X enhanced don't know they use X under covers and thus won't demand the new features. The license terms do not allow that as Y has to reproduce X's license statement. * Y has to merge my changes with theirs and make a new release of X enhanced. * Y refuses to do that. If X's new features are good enough, they'll eventually lose their customers to X. * Y gets sick of merging and contributes their improvements back. I've seen all four scenarios happen. The second and third option usually become so uncomfortable for Y that they tend to use the fourth over time, but there is no guarantee. Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Fri, 10 Oct 2003, Scott Hernandez [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If the Ant team had the option, now that they have been out there so long, I wonder if they would choose a sep. license for any reason. I can only speak for myself, I wouldn't. Ant has become as successful as it is for several reasons and one of them is IDE integration. Something that would have been difficult not only for commercial IDEs but also for NetBeans or Eclipse to do if the license was more rstricitve. I understand that IDEs are more important in Java land than in the .NET world where resistance against Visual Studio look futile. I wonder if there are times that they wish they could have stopped someone from doing something with another license. There has been one point, where a company released a version of Ant that shipped with a modified javac task. This task would perform some smarter dependency scanning than Ant's built-in task does and thus avoid the situation where Ant requires you to do a clean compile to pick up all code changes. They claimed their version of Ant was up to ten times faster than Ant. But realistically you can't protect yourself against wrong claims with your license. It could have been another open-source project that used the same wrong statement, so prohibiting commercial modifications won't help here. What has helped have been our users 8-) They challenged the company with their real world build files (where javac by itself usually takes a very small share of total build time) on the companies discussion board and the claim pretty soon vanished. Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
RE: [nant-dev] Licensing
Hi Brant, Good scenarios. In the first one, you have to really ask why someone might want to do this, you might consider it if you were building a commercial product to support application development (say a new SCC system) and you wanted to offer NAnt users very good integration by shipping a bunch of tasks for this purpose. I'm not sure where I stand on the other two scenarios - so I'll refrain from making a generalised judgement. - Mitch Denny - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www.monash.net - +61 (414) 610141 - -Original Message- From: Brant Carter [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Saturday, October 11, 2003 3:03 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing I think we should ask ourselves what types of uses we would want NAnt to be available to. Here are two scenarios. [1] A commerical company wants to release a custom task and charge money for it. Do we want to allow this? [2] A commerical company wants to distribute a customized version of NAnt as part of its software package (ie: A compiler company, IDE developer) and charge money for the entire package. Do we want to allow this? [3] A company creates a large software package that requires it to be built by the end customer. Are they allowed to distribute NAnt to do this? What if they modified NAnt in some way? brant ... _ Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Thu, 9 Oct 2003, Gert Driesen [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: unless there's a slight chance that Apache is going to accept .NET projects :-) At the risk of repeating myself, I'm sure that the ASF would not reject a project just because it used .NET. The ASF hosts projects written in C, Perl, Tcl, Python, Java, C++ and PHP (I'm almost sure the list is incomplete). This here http://cvs.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/avalon-sandbox/avalon-net/ looks a lot like C# too me (and isn't this http://cvs.apache.org/viewcvs.cgi/avalon-sandbox/avalon-net/Avalon.build a NAnt build file?). Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Thu, 09 Oct 2003, Matthew Mastracci [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I'm not sure that I agree with changing the license to a BSD or Apache-style license. As you are responding to a mail of mine, please note that I've just explained some things about different licenses and what would be involved with changing the license. I did so because Ian and Gert said this was what the project intended to do. Personally I'd be glad to see NAnt switch to a different license, but I'm not involved in this project and would never try to push it. The code I've contributed was for a GPL project - changing it now would be the same to me as a bait-and-switch scheme pulled by a company. I'm very glad you say that (now). This is the reason why I said that the project must make sure with all past contributors that a license change would be fine with them. NAnt works well as a GPL'd project. It's effectively a stand-alone project. Any company wanting to incorporate it could simply bundle the executable. You cannot write a NAnt task that uses parts of NAnt's API and distribute that task under a license other than GPL (think of Subversion or NUnit distributing a NAnt task for example). Same for a GUI sitting on top of NAnt or IDE plugins or ... If you use NAnt's API, you are creating a derived work. I don't see how a GPL'd .NET build project would scare people away more than a GPL'd C++ compiler. Using NAnt is no problem (as using gcc or Emacs), extending NAnt would be. Cheers Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
On Fri, 10 Oct 2003, Mitch Denny [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I have one question about the wording though. The section Redistribution and USE (my emphasis) in source and binary forms. Does this mean that if I build a set of tasks and compile them into a separate assembly, but don't ship the NAnt libraries along with them [...] I still have to ship this license? All parts that talk about retaining/reproducing the copyright notice explicitly only mention Redistribution. USE only applies to the You may not use my name and NO WARRANTY parts. IANAL and all that ... Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
Hi all, I do not bother about licences much but: NAnt works well as a GPL'd project. It's effectively a stand-alone project. Any company wanting to incorporate it could simply bundle the executable. You cannot write a NAnt task that uses parts of NAnt's API and distribute that task under a license other than GPL (think of Subversion or NUnit distributing a NAnt task for example). Same for a GUI sitting on top of NAnt or IDE plugins or ... If you use NAnt's API, you are creating a derived work. I don't see how a GPL'd .NET build project would scare people away more than a GPL'd C++ compiler. Using NAnt is no problem (as using gcc or Emacs), extending NAnt would be. Very true. I use my own tasks and patches now. Hope it is completely ok, unless I distribute them. I don't so I'm happy. But I think, linking exception _should_ be accepted. Downloading new Subversion version from their site including NAnt plugin should be great! Anyway - GPL+linking exception or Apache or BSD seems the same for me. Maybe we should rather use GPL (because project begins as GPL) and maybe add second licence (dual licence scheme). I see (and use) some projects with GPL+MPL dual licence. Martin btw: bundle nunit, nunit2 and nunitreport tasks with nunit rather than nant itself is good idea, I think! --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
I think we should ask ourselves what types of uses we would want NAnt to be available to. Here are two scenarios. [1] A commerical company wants to release a custom task and charge money for it. Do we want to allow this? [2] A commerical company wants to distribute a customized version of NAnt as part of its software package (ie: A compiler company, IDE developer) and charge money for the entire package. Do we want to allow this? [3] A company creates a large software package that requires it to be built by the end customer. Are they allowed to distribute NAnt to do this? What if they modified NAnt in some way? brant ... _ Add photos to your e-mail with MSN 8. Get 2 months FREE*. http://join.msn.com/?page=features/featuredemail --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
All of these scenarios should be allowed, IMHO. - Original Message - From: Brant Carter [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, October 10, 2003 10:02 AM Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing I think we should ask ourselves what types of uses we would want NAnt to be available to. Here are two scenarios. [1] A commerical company wants to release a custom task and charge money for it. Do we want to allow this? [2] A commerical company wants to distribute a customized version of NAnt as part of its software package (ie: A compiler company, IDE developer) and charge money for the entire package. Do we want to allow this? [3] A company creates a large software package that requires it to be built by the end customer. Are they allowed to distribute NAnt to do this? What if they modified NAnt in some way? brant --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
- Original Message - From: Matthew Mastracci [EMAIL PROTECTED] Ian MacLean wrote: Matt, what are your specific objections to a BSD style licence ? Is it the greater permissiveness or just that its not GPL ? My largest concern is not that a company can use BSD-code, but rather add core enhancements (ie: modifications/enhancements/bug fixes to the core code) and keep those proprietary. I personally don't mind people keeping peripheral enhancements to themselves (for example, someone wishing to build a proprietary link between their app and NAnt, an NAnt gui, etc.), but it's good to get things like bug fixes and the like back from people using the code. It is great to get bug reports (and esp. patches) back from users. If someone is going to do this I don't think it matters what license the software is under. I don't feel pressed to send code patches to groups based on the license. Sure, I may be bound by the license to do it, but no one is going to force me. Would changing the license from GPL keep you from contributing code, ideas and being an active member of the development team? Well if you consider that most users looking at using NAnt come from microsoft shops and have likely been exposed to/scared by the microsoft anti-GPL FUD. Compared to gcc users who are mostly all on Unix/linux or MaxOSX and are rather less fazed by that kind of thing. We have had a number of comments from consultants ( some from MS consulting ) and book authors that they would like to recomend NAnt to clients/corporations but had concerns about the license. Whether those concerns are valid is another issue however anecdotal evidence seems to suggest that this is a real concern for some people. I'd like to hear more from list members about corporate policy's regarding opensource usage and licenses. One other possibility I'd like to throw out these is keeping the core codebase under the GPL (or changing to the LGPL) and offering a business friendly binary distribution under a different license. This license could exclude any GPL viral terms that might be frightening off those with license concerns. If business users are concerned with using GPL'd executables this could possibly satisfy them. Those people looking to get the source could still grab the (L)GPL'd code from Sourceforge. This suggestion may not require a license change, but would likely require buy-in from the development group for the binary-licensed distribution. From a marketing point of view it is really good to keep a single license. The more license we use the more confusing the questions become. Going to a BSD/Apache style license is something we can evangelize and something to point to as a change in the project. We can get more people involved with NAnt if we have a less restrictive license. As Ian has pointed out, there is a lot of bad press around the viral affects of the GPL. Even if we do have a clause to lessen those restrictions, people will still react to the GPL part of the license and may not pay attention to the additional licensing clauses. I too lean more towards the LGPL license in some cases. In this case I look at what Ant has done under the Apache license. I don't see any problems they have run into (in choosing that license). If the Ant team had the option, now that they have been out there so long, I wonder if they would choose a sep. license for any reason. I wonder if there are times that they wish they could have stopped someone from doing something with another license. (I know that this is not an option as it is an apache project :) --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
I agree, though in [2] and [3] I believe that changes (if any) to the core NAnt code should be contributed back. Scott Hernandez wrote: All of these scenarios should be allowed, IMHO. - Original Message - From: Brant Carter [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, October 10, 2003 10:02 AM Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing I think we should ask ourselves what types of uses we would want NAnt to be available to. Here are two scenarios. [1] A commerical company wants to release a custom task and charge money for it. Do we want to allow this? [2] A commerical company wants to distribute a customized version of NAnt as part of its software package (ie: A compiler company, IDE developer) and charge money for the entire package. Do we want to allow this? [3] A company creates a large software package that requires it to be built by the end customer. Are they allowed to distribute NAnt to do this? What if they modified NAnt in some way? brant --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
While replying to your note, I noticed the following on our license page: http://nant.sourceforge.net/license.html --- NAnt ships with a prebuilt version of NDoc. The NAnt license does not apply to these components located in the bin folder of the distribution. NDoc is licensed under the GNU General Public License. --- (also see http://cvs.sourceforge.net/viewcvs.py/ndoc/ndoc/COPYING.txt?rev=1.2view=auto) We would have to remove NDoc support if we moved to a different license. Unfortunately, this would also include moving to the LGPL. NUnit appears to be safe, though they have a clear anti-commercial (ie: you can't sell this product for profit) statement in the license. It isn't very clear on whether bundling the product with a commercial one is alright, though I assume that it's within the spirit. :) --- All of the NUnit source code is Copyright 2000-2002 by Philip Craig. All rights reserved. This software comes with no warranty whatsoever; Philip Craig does not accept any liability for any damage or loss resulting from the use of this software, no matter how caused. You can use this software free of charge, but you must not sell it beyond charging for reasonable distribution costs. This software includes classes and documentation from JUnit - see the licence for the JUnit licence. --- Scott Hernandez wrote: My largest concern is not that a company can use BSD-code, but rather add core enhancements (ie: modifications/enhancements/bug fixes to the core code) and keep those proprietary. I personally don't mind people keeping peripheral enhancements to themselves (for example, someone wishing to build a proprietary link between their app and NAnt, an NAnt gui, etc.), but it's good to get things like bug fixes and the like back from people using the code. It is great to get bug reports (and esp. patches) back from users. If someone is going to do this I don't think it matters what license the software is under. I don't feel pressed to send code patches to groups based on the license. Sure, I may be bound by the license to do it, but no one is going to force me. Agreed - though if you were to distribute the program publically, it's likely that someone could call you on it. Would changing the license from GPL keep you from contributing code, ideas and being an active member of the development team? Nope - I mentioned before that I would accept whatever license was agreed to by the development group as a whole, even if I don't agree completely with it. :) One other possibility I'd like to throw out these is keeping the core codebase under the GPL (or changing to the LGPL) and offering a business friendly binary distribution under a different license. ... This suggestion may not require a license change, but would likely require buy-in from the development group for the binary-licensed distribution. From a marketing point of view it is really good to keep a single license. The more license we use the more confusing the questions become. Going to a BSD/Apache style license is something we can evangelize and something to point to as a change in the project. This is true. We can get more people involved with NAnt if we have a less restrictive license. As Ian has pointed out, there is a lot of bad press around the viral affects of the GPL. Even if we do have a clause to lessen those restrictions, people will still react to the GPL part of the license and may not pay attention to the additional licensing clauses. I too lean more towards the LGPL license in some cases. In this case I look at what Ant has done under the Apache license. I don't see any problems they have run into (in choosing that license). If the Ant team had the option, now that they have been out there so long, I wonder if they would choose a sep. license for any reason. I wonder if there are times that they wish they could have stopped someone from doing something with another license. (I know that this is not an option as it is an apache project :) I'm not completely certain about this part. I guess I'm just not a fan of having to pander to the fear of others, but that might just be my personality. :) Perhaps instead of avoiding the issue by changing licenses, we could point people at a page explaining *why* the GPL won't make all of their proprietary IP automatically open-sourced. Like I said before: whatever we agree on I'll support. Just want to make sure I get my voice out there. ;) Matt. --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
[nant-dev] Licensing
Trying to chime in with a bit of experience from seeing project migrate to the ASF. On Wed, 8 Oct 2003, Gert Driesen [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: From: Clayton Harbour [EMAIL PROTECTED] On another note you mentioned license changes, I have always been curious how that works/ is accomplished? If you want to be really really save: Get all people who have ever contributed anything to your code to agree on changing the license with the next release. You cannot change the license for your older releases, they've already been out. And the people who have contributed code still hold the copyright to it (even under US law AFAIU). Doing it with the next release also gives people who prefer the old license the opportunity to have a stable forking point. They can pick up the code from before the license change and create a new project from there. I did have a quick look at the licensing stuff, and to me it seems like a BSD-style license is the most open license ... I feel I should put a big disclaimer in before I proceed. I'm a member of the Apache Software Foundation. I am biased. I'll try to be fair when comparing the licenses, but may very well fail to do so. All major open source licenses have their pros and cons. The (L)GPL on the one side and the BSDish licenses on the other simply have a different focus. Behind the (L)GPL is the philosophy of Free Software as defined by the FSF. It is a philosophy and a political manifesto that you can agree with or not. The GPL has been crafted to enforce this vision. The GPL as well as BSDish licenses give their users the right to get the code for free and to modify it. The GPL takes away the user's right to distribute the modified software under different licensing terms, and it does so because it wouldn't be Free Software anymore otherwise. If you have any problem with big companies making money with your software without giving anything back to you - the BSDish licenses are not for you. As for most open, I'd say the MIT license[1] probably is the winner here. It basically says do with this what you want, don't blame me. The BSD license[2] adds one thing don't advertize with my name, at least not without asking for permission. And the Apache Software License[3] adds brand protection on top of this. Don't call your derived project like mine. Note that this brand protection is the part that makes the FSF claim the Apache Software License was incompatible with the GPL (i.e. a GPLed software must not include Apache licensed code). Footnotes: [1] http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.php [2] http://www.opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php [3] http://www.opensource.org/licenses/apachepl.php The rest is my personal opinion, don't read on if you don't want to see that 8-) I for one don't agree with the FSF's vision, I feed my children from money I get for writing commercial software and I don't feel bad about it. I enjoy writing software and giving it away for free as well - and if I contribute to a open source project that uses a BSDish license I get the additional benefit that I may use my own code (plus improvements made by others) for the commercial software I write. If a big company comes and takes my code, modifies it and redistributes it as a commercial product, this is no problem for me. I don't believe in free software, I believe in improved software and that the commercial company will realize that it is in their better interest to contribute their changes back instead of merging my changes with theirs over and over again over time. Stefan --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
- Original Message - From: Ian MacLean [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Stefan Bodewig [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2003 5:54 PM Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing Thanks for the info Stefan, I tend to agree with you re FSF and associated philosophy. There sould be no reason we can't get the licencing change in for the next release - assuming we can deal with any copyright holder issues. So now we need to make the official dicision as to which licence. I'm leaning towards BSD - what are everyone elses thoughts ? I would also prefer BSD, unless there's a slight chance that Apache is going to accept .NET projects :-) Gert --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
Re: [nant-dev] Licensing
Hi, * Am 09.10.2003 (18:18) schrieb Gert Driesen: There sould be no reason we can't get the licencing change in for the next release - assuming we can deal with any copyright holder issues. So now we need to make the official dicision as to which licence. I'm leaning towards BSD - what are everyone elses thoughts ? I would also prefer BSD, unless there's a slight chance that Apache is going to accept .NET projects :-) Just my 2 cents on licensing change or stay or whatever: * I think any license change should remember it's contributers thoughts. One main thing is, that we all contributed here because we think it' a great done job and it helps us in out current job. If we help us with writing tasks and posting it here, we help others. But one thing is no one likes to see his work be used by a third person to earn a lot of money without seeing the project *mentioned*. * On the other a build tool will find it's way to corporate use. We had a discussion earlier. Corporate use brings up long time developed helpers, which won't be under an OS License. Support for NAnt will be probably included, and this would lead to licensing issues (breaking included). Who'll fight in case of licensing issues? One sole developer? The lead developers as representatives? Who pays? In dept, no one. Who wants to have companies having this problems? No one. We're all happy when NAnt can and will be used in a corporate environment. If a license change helps to improve relationship here, I'm strongly pro change. As said. Just my cents. 'til tomorrow. -sa -- sa at programmers-world dot com http://www.livingit.de Boomarks online: http://www.mobile-bookmarks.info Soon available in english Mail geschrieben: Donnerstag, den 09. Oktober 2003 um 22:41 --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
RE: [nant-dev] Licensing
+1 for BSD. But lets post it up here for everyones reference: license Copyright (c) 2003, NAnt Project All rights reserved. Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met: Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. Neither the name of the NAnt project nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission. THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS AS IS AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. /license I have one question about the wording though. The section Redistribution and USE (my emphasis) in source and binary forms. Does this mean that if I build a set of tasks and compile them into a separate assembly, but don't ship the NAnt libraries along with them (I assume the people I am sending to already have them) I still have to ship this license? Its not a major issue because I don't intend to profit from the libraries - but its just one more thing I have to put in the bundle (I want to be legally covered). - Mitch Denny - [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www.monash.net - +61 (414) 610141 - -Original Message- From: Gert Driesen [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, October 10, 2003 2:18 AM To: Ian MacLean; Stefan Bodewig Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing - Original Message - From: Ian MacLean [EMAIL PROTECTED] To: Stefan Bodewig [EMAIL PROTECTED] Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, October 09, 2003 5:54 PM Subject: Re: [nant-dev] Licensing Thanks for the info Stefan, I tend to agree with you re FSF and associated philosophy. There sould be no reason we can't get the licencing change in for the next release - assuming we can deal with any copyright holder issues. So now we need to make the official dicision as to which licence. I'm leaning towards BSD - what are everyone elses thoughts ? I would also prefer BSD, unless there's a slight chance that Apache is going to accept .NET projects :-) Gert --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers --- This SF.net email is sponsored by: SF.net Giveback Program. SourceForge.net hosts over 70,000 Open Source Projects. See the people who have HELPED US provide better services: Click here: http://sourceforge.net/supporters.php ___ nant-developers mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/nant-developers
