Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-10 Thread Anders Wallenquist 

2014-07-10 02:03, Axel Mendoza Pupo skrev:
Some time ago I did some modules for another software based on code 
taken from OpenERP v7.0 and those modules was accepted to be part of 
the software core functionalities. The modules was developed to be 
able to send and receive emails via SMTP, POP3 and IMAP.


My question are related to the license restriction that someone may 
have when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to 
develop new features for another software.

Odoo have the license:
GNU AFFERO GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE, Version 3, 19 November 2007
And the other software have LGPL license

The software maintainer write me with concerns about the license 
interactions, and the news that the modules could not be integrated 
into the core without removing the OpenERP source code.


Is there a way to allow someone to do this kind of develop based on 
OpenERP source code??


I don't know the background of the choice of LGPL for the other part of 
the software. Usually LGPL are choosen for libraries that could be 
incorporated in other software that is closed source, apache/bsd or GPL. 
If you had choosen GPL for the main-project and LGPL for 
libraries/drivers and other stuff you think other projects can use - it 
makes sense for an free software project. Then you are using GPL to 
protect the main codeset but widen the use for not so important parts 
(libraries/drivers). Or if you had choosen a closed source, apache/bsd 
style for your main project and LGPL for code that you think other 
projects can use. If you know that your customers want to close your 
code and you don't bother apache/bsd-style of licences are good. If you 
are a small company and don't want Oracle or other large company to 
"steal" or close your code GPL are better.


I think the force for Google to choose a weak licence for Android/Dalvik 
was large telcos  that want to build their own user interfaces and 
drivers for hardware using closed source.


Regards
Anders Wallenquist



We all develop OpenSource


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Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-10 Thread Raphael Valyi 
Hello Lionel,

I agree with what you said but let me just correct one point because I
think these licensing things should really be taken seriously in general:

On Thu, Jul 10, 2014 at 5:58 AM, Lionel Sausin  wrote:

> Le 10/07/2014 02:03, Axel Mendoza Pupo a écrit :
>
>  My question are related to the license restriction that someone may have
>> when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to develop new
>> features for another software.
>>
> I'm not a lawer but:
> 1 - this is clearly "derivative work" of both the odoo module
> 2 - it's admitted that modules are themselves derivative works of the core.
> so AGPL applies to your code.
>
> Simply re-implement the AGPL part from scratch, i think it'd clear the
> problem and should be easy enough for a single module.
> Odoo SA themselves did that when they switched to AGPL, for small parts
> which conflicting contributors refused to relicence.
>

Not to my knowledge.

in 2009 they moved from GPL to AGPL and as you can see in that graph
http://timreview.ca/ojs/february11/february11_daffara1.png you can always
include GPL code (the contribs) in and AGPL software without asking
anyone's permission because the AGPL still preserve the user guaranties of
the GPL, it just adds an extra guarantee that the user will receive the
source code even if the software is distributed online like a SaaS without
binary distribution. If somebody did not agree with that at that time, they
didn't have their contrib violated by the AGPL branch and they could very
much start maintaining a pure GPL branch without the AGPL evolution and in
fact this is exactly what the Tryton fork did.

Now, during 2011, there have been an attempt (so 3 after 3 years of
contribs under strict AGPL when OpenERP SA was still peanuts and largely
supported by a community, without any contributor agreement of any sort
granting else than AGPL) to change the AGPL license adding some extra non
symmetric clause that would allow OpenERP SA to sell the right (in the
Enterprise contract) to a 3rd party to not submit its code to the AGPL
clause (the private modules thing). Well in that case, contributors were
not asked anything and it was said that if somebody disagree they would
rewrite (nice isn't it?) and no extensive rewrite was done either...

So personally I would love to see that kind of clause removed, specially as
it sets Odoo a bit aside from the OSI licenses and introduce a juridic risk
that someday in the long future, a big company like SAP or whatever could
use to attack the Odoo product or a company using it with these kind of
licensing terms. If you see what happened with Oracle and Google for things
that would be details compared to this, I wouldn't try that kind of thing
if someday Odoo achieve some of its potential.
That last 2011 move has been compiled in that blog post at the time
http://version2beta.com/articles/a-new-openerp-product-and-license/

I like very much the OpenERP / Odoo project, but no sorry I cannot stand
that kind of licensing approximations. We do open source because it's
something we like, not because we are stupid. Today OpenERP SA received yet
a new investment of 10 millions USD. What will happen if the business plan
fail, just like it already failed with Openbravo or Compiere
http://www.compieresource.com/2010/06/compiere-open-source-failed.html ?
Should all the people who invest in OpenERP / Odoo expose themselves to
licensing threats whenever the original founders may not be the ones that
would decide for the software anymore? For me open source is meant to be
safe, safer that proprietary software (even if they can be late o
schedule). So this is the very reason I don't like these approximations.

So I just wanted to clarify that point but aside from that I agree on all
you said.

Best regards.


-- 
Raphaël Valyi
Founder and consultant
http://twitter.com/rvalyi 
+55 21 3942-2434
www.akretion.com
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Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-10 Thread Lionel Sausin 

Le 10/07/2014 02:03, Axel Mendoza Pupo a écrit :
My question are related to the license restriction that someone may 
have when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to 
develop new features for another software.

I'm not a lawer but:
1 - this is clearly "derivative work" of both the odoo module
2 - it's admitted that modules are themselves derivative works of the core.
so AGPL applies to your code.

Simply re-implement the AGPL part from scratch, i think it'd clear the 
problem and should be easy enough for a single module.
Odoo SA themselves did that when they switched to AGPL, for small parts 
which conflicting contributors refused to relicence.


If reimplemnting is a problem, you still have the option to get a 
double-licence AGPL + LGPL :

1 - ask the original author of the module to relicence it as LGPL
2 - ask Odoo SA for a licence - I think they don't do that for the core 
itself, but here for a module they have nothing to do with, maybe they'd 
make an exception. You can always ask.



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Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-09 Thread Raphael Valyi 
On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 11:57 PM, Axel Mendoza Pupo 
wrote:

> That's helps a lot, thanks. My modules right now are apart from the core,
> the idea is to get integrated into the API ecosystem. They are tools to be
> used in an ESB environment to send and receive mails while developing web
> services. Right now they live as part as a module, so you said that if the
> module is licensed as AGPL 3, then it can be used as a dependency and the
> rest of the software could remains LGPL without get contaminated with the
> AGPL 3 restrictions??
>

If I understand correctly, you said your program in an Odoo module. Then
yes, it has to be distributed as AGPL 3.

Now yes, the rest of the software that is LGPL, can use that module calling
it with an API (XML/RPC, JSON...) without being contaminated. That's what
you mean when you said an ESB would call it, right?

Now basically, if instead a program does
from openerp import fields, orm or whatever
then it that program needs to be licensed under AGPL. That's the case of an
Odoo module with Python code for instance.

Now if some 3rd party tool is importing that contaminated AGPL module as a
Python module, then yes, that program get its overall distribution
contaminated as AGPL. But calling with a webservice would be OK.

An other possible architecture without web service could be:

   - LGPL software code imports your program that is licensed under
   whatever license
   - the Odoo module also imports your program.


The the wrapping code importing your program should be AGPL, but the
program itself can have whatever license because it doesn't depend on
Odoo's code. This is the same principle how NVidia graphic drivers work
around the GPL restrictions of the Linux Kernel and they even earn some
very special love from the Linux community with this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_36yNWw_07g&feature=kp

So you see, there are lot's of opportunities to build nice products and
nice product reputations ;-)

-- 
Raphaël Valyi
Founder and consultant
http://twitter.com/rvalyi 
+55 21 3942-2434
www.akretion.com
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Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-09 Thread Axel Mendoza Pupo 
That's helps a lot, thanks. My modules right now are apart from the core,
the idea is to get integrated into the API ecosystem. They are tools to be
used in an ESB environment to send and receive mails while developing web
services. Right now they live as part as a module, so you said that if the
module is licensed as AGPL 3, then it can be used as a dependency and the
rest of the software could remains LGPL without get contaminated with the
AGPL 3 restrictions??



On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 8:32 PM, Raphael Valyi  wrote:

> Hello Axel,
>
> this is probably correct: basically you cannot put AGPL v3 code
> (OpenERP/Odoo) along with LGPL code without distributing the combined work
> under the AGPL v3 (which is aggressively open source ad may not be inline
> with the philosophy of that LGPL software).
>
> "open source" sounds like just a simple word but there are very important
> licensing details. For instance if you heard about the Oracle vs Google
> case, both software were "open source", Java was GPL and Google developed
> Dalvik under was Apache 2 because they didn't want to use GPL code OpenJDK
> in their phones. You see were it went...
>
> So yes, that may sounds boring but that's true. Not all open source
> projects have the same vision: GPL and AGPL have a "copyleft" vision where
> all derivative work should respect their initial license, that ensure for
> instance that any user can get access to the source code. That's very nice
> for the user, but sometimes that's not so nice for the editor business or
> just even the software production, that's why other licenses, such as LGPL
> instead allows making closed source software with their code to some extent.
>
> The following graph may help you to get an idea of how it works and how
> AGPL v3 seats as the most "militant" license here:
> http://timreview.ca/ojs/february11/february11_daffara1.png
>
> (and that's a choice that was made by OpenERP SA during 2009 as they moved
> from GPL to AGPL deliberately)
>
>
> Eventually you can take the AGPL code you extracted from OpenERP and wrap
> is in a small web service that you would publish as AGPL code and call that
> webservice from your LGPL code without "contaminating" it. It's the same
> thing as browsing Odoo with Internet Explorer doesn't force Microsoft to
> publish Internet Explorer closed source source code.
>
> So AGPL is cool because it prevents some big company to come and make a
> close version of Odoo and destroy the work of everybody from the community
> or even OpenERP SA and the freedom of their users, or even in the
> eventuality OpenERP SA would fail as a business and the founder wouldn't be
> the ones deciding for the software anymore.
> But while it's there to avoid such hijacking, you can still probably work
> around your use case with a proper architecture if you really need some
> Odoo features at some point in your project. In fact the hardest part of
> AGPL is probably the fact that nobody sells modules, so the ecosystem is a
> bit slower to develop, but the good part is that unlike something like
> Magento apps store, it's there to stay.
>
> Hope this helps.
>
>
> --
> Raphaël Valyi
> Founder and consultant
> http://twitter.com/rvalyi 
> +55 21 3942-2434
> www.akretion.com
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 9:03 PM, Axel Mendoza Pupo 
> wrote:
>
>> Some time ago I did some modules for another software based on code taken
>> from OpenERP v7.0 and those modules was accepted to be part of the software
>> core functionalities. The modules was developed to be able to send and
>> receive emails via SMTP, POP3 and IMAP.
>>
>> My question are related to the license restriction that someone may have
>> when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to develop new
>> features for another software.
>> Odoo have the license:
>> GNU AFFERO GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE, Version 3, 19 November 2007
>> And the other software have LGPL license
>>
>> The software maintainer write me with concerns about the license
>> interactions, and the news that the modules could not be integrated into
>> the core without removing the OpenERP source code.
>>
>> Is there a way to allow someone to do this kind of develop based on
>> OpenERP source code??
>>
>> We all develop OpenSource
>>
>> ___
>> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> Post to : openerp-community@lists.launchpad.net
>> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
>> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>>
>>
>
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Re: [Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-09 Thread Raphael Valyi 
Hello Axel,

this is probably correct: basically you cannot put AGPL v3 code
(OpenERP/Odoo) along with LGPL code without distributing the combined work
under the AGPL v3 (which is aggressively open source ad may not be inline
with the philosophy of that LGPL software).

"open source" sounds like just a simple word but there are very important
licensing details. For instance if you heard about the Oracle vs Google
case, both software were "open source", Java was GPL and Google developed
Dalvik under was Apache 2 because they didn't want to use GPL code OpenJDK
in their phones. You see were it went...

So yes, that may sounds boring but that's true. Not all open source
projects have the same vision: GPL and AGPL have a "copyleft" vision where
all derivative work should respect their initial license, that ensure for
instance that any user can get access to the source code. That's very nice
for the user, but sometimes that's not so nice for the editor business or
just even the software production, that's why other licenses, such as LGPL
instead allows making closed source software with their code to some extent.

The following graph may help you to get an idea of how it works and how
AGPL v3 seats as the most "militant" license here:
http://timreview.ca/ojs/february11/february11_daffara1.png

(and that's a choice that was made by OpenERP SA during 2009 as they moved
from GPL to AGPL deliberately)


Eventually you can take the AGPL code you extracted from OpenERP and wrap
is in a small web service that you would publish as AGPL code and call that
webservice from your LGPL code without "contaminating" it. It's the same
thing as browsing Odoo with Internet Explorer doesn't force Microsoft to
publish Internet Explorer closed source source code.

So AGPL is cool because it prevents some big company to come and make a
close version of Odoo and destroy the work of everybody from the community
or even OpenERP SA and the freedom of their users, or even in the
eventuality OpenERP SA would fail as a business and the founder wouldn't be
the ones deciding for the software anymore.
But while it's there to avoid such hijacking, you can still probably work
around your use case with a proper architecture if you really need some
Odoo features at some point in your project. In fact the hardest part of
AGPL is probably the fact that nobody sells modules, so the ecosystem is a
bit slower to develop, but the good part is that unlike something like
Magento apps store, it's there to stay.

Hope this helps.


-- 
Raphaël Valyi
Founder and consultant
http://twitter.com/rvalyi 
+55 21 3942-2434
www.akretion.com





On Wed, Jul 9, 2014 at 9:03 PM, Axel Mendoza Pupo  wrote:

> Some time ago I did some modules for another software based on code taken
> from OpenERP v7.0 and those modules was accepted to be part of the software
> core functionalities. The modules was developed to be able to send and
> receive emails via SMTP, POP3 and IMAP.
>
> My question are related to the license restriction that someone may have
> when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to develop new
> features for another software.
> Odoo have the license:
> GNU AFFERO GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE, Version 3, 19 November 2007
> And the other software have LGPL license
>
> The software maintainer write me with concerns about the license
> interactions, and the news that the modules could not be integrated into
> the core without removing the OpenERP source code.
>
> Is there a way to allow someone to do this kind of develop based on
> OpenERP source code??
>
> We all develop OpenSource
>
> ___
> Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
> Post to : openerp-community@lists.launchpad.net
> Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~openerp-community
> More help   : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
>
>
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[Openerp-community] Odoo License restriction?

2014-07-09 Thread Axel Mendoza Pupo 
Some time ago I did some modules for another software based on code taken
from OpenERP v7.0 and those modules was accepted to be part of the software
core functionalities. The modules was developed to be able to send and
receive emails via SMTP, POP3 and IMAP.

My question are related to the license restriction that someone may have
when the code from OpenERP/Odoo is used in a modified form to develop new
features for another software.
Odoo have the license:
GNU AFFERO GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE, Version 3, 19 November 2007
And the other software have LGPL license

The software maintainer write me with concerns about the license
interactions, and the news that the modules could not be integrated into
the core without removing the OpenERP source code.

Is there a way to allow someone to do this kind of develop based on OpenERP
source code??

We all develop OpenSource
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