On Mon, 17 Oct 2005 20:13:05 -0700 Jeremy T. Bouse wrote:
> Let me preface with saying I am not subscribed to debian-legal so
> please inclusion of Cc: to me directly would be appreciated.
OK, done.
>
> I am inquiring further clarification on the PHP license (I'm
> including v2.2 and v3.0) as to whether or not they qualify as DFSG. I
> ask this as most all PEAR modules (similar to Perl's CPAN) appear to
> be licensed under this license. I know it is listed with the Open
> Source Initiative as an open source license but I've long since
> learned that doesn't mean Debian accepts everything OSI does.
Right.
>
> If a consensus on this could be reached it would be appreciated as
> if PEAR modules licensed under the PHP license are non-DFSG that means
> most, if not all, PEAR modules would be non-free at best and with many
> PHP applications making use of PEAR modules would mean moving them
> from main to contrib or non-free themselves.
Adopting the PHP license for anything that is not PHP itself is an issue
that was discussed on this list back in August.
Actually the thread (titled "[PEAR-DEV] PHP License") was a giant
crosspost on several lists (debian-legal, debian-webapps and various
pear-*@*php.net).
The recommendation was to avoid using the PHP license for PEAR modules
and relicense them under a 2-clause BSD license.
There's even a bug about this: http://pear.php.net/bugs/bug.php?id=5473
(but take into account that I haven't yet found the time to read it...)
[php-license-v2_02.txt text/plain (3826 bytes)]
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> The PHP License, version 2.02
> Copyright (c) 1999 - 2002 The PHP Group. All rights reserved.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
[...]
> 3. The name "PHP" must not be used to endorse or promote products
> derived from this software without prior permission from the
> PHP Group. This does not apply to add-on libraries or tools
> that work in conjunction with PHP. In such a case the PHP
> name may be used to indicate that the product supports PHP.
This is a sort of name-change clause (permitted by DFSG#4) *if* the
license is applied to PHP itself.
It's really inappropriate for anything that is *not* PHP itself
(especially when the copyright holder is not the PHP Group).
[...]
> 5. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following
> acknowledgment:
> "This product includes PHP, freely available from
> http://www.php.net/";.
This clause forces redistributors to lie, *if* the license is applied to
anything but PHP itself.
OK for PHP itself, non-free for anything else.
>
> 6. The software incorporates the Zend Engine, a product of Zend
> Technologies, Ltd. ("Zend").
This is not true for anything that does not actually include the Zend
Engine!
> The Zend Engine is licensed to the
> PHP Association (pursuant to a grant from Zend that can be
> found at http://www.php.net/license/ZendGrant/) for
> distribution to you under this license agreement, only as a
> part of PHP. In the event that you separate the Zend Engine
> (or any portion thereof) from the rest of the software, or
> modify the Zend Engine, or any portion thereof, your use of the
> separated or modified Zend Engine software shall not be governed
> by this license, and instead shall be governed by the license
> set forth at http://www.zend.com/license/ZendLicense/.
This fails DFSG#3, as I'm not able to extract and/or modify the Zend
Engine, thus creating a derivative work of PHP+Zend and distribute the
result under the same terms as the license of the original software.
>
>
>
> THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE PHP DEVELOPMENT TEAM ``AS IS''
True when we are talking about PHP itself.
False for anything that is not provided by the PHP development team...
[...]
> This software consists of voluntary contributions made by many
> individuals on behalf of the PHP Group.
Again false when applied to software that is not developed by the PHP
Group.
[php-license-v3_0.txt text/plain (3359 bytes)]
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> The PHP License, version 3.0
> Copyright (c) 1999 - 2005 The PHP Group. All rights reserved.
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
[...]
> 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 group@php.net.
Again OK for PHP itself, inappropriate for anything else.
>
> 4. Products derived from this software may not be called "PHP", nor
> may "PHP" appear in their name, without prior written permission
> from group@php.net. You may indicate that your software works in
> conjunction with PHP by saying "Foo for PHP" instead of calling
> it "PHP Foo" or "phpfoo"
When the license is applied to PHP itself, this starts as a name-change
clause, but then goes beyond and forbids an entire class of names for
derived works (any name having "PHP" as a substring, minus some
exceptions).
This is overreaching, IMO, and makes the clause non-free.
This gets even worse when applied to anything that is not PHP itself.
[...]
> 6. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following
> acknowledgment:
> "This product includes PHP, freely available from
> <http://www.php.net/>".
Again, this forces redistributors to lie, when applied to anything but
PHP itself.
>
> THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE PHP DEVELOPMENT TEAM ``AS IS''
Once again false for anything not provided by the PHP development team.
[...]
> This software consists of voluntary contributions made by many
> individuals on behalf of the PHP Group.
Again...
[...]
> This product includes the Zend Engine, freely available at
> <http://www.zend.com>.
Again...
--
:-( This Universe is buggy! Where's the Creator's BTS? ;-)
......................................................................
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