Re: Debian based GNU/Solaris: pilot program
On Thu, Nov 03, 2005 at 12:39:25PM -0800, Erast Benson wrote:
> On Thu, 2005-11-03 at 20:00 +0000, Matthew Garrett wrote:
> > However, as has already been pointed out to you, Debian has no control
> > over the people who hold the copyright on dpkg. Knowing several of them
> > personally, I'd be surprised if they're willing to relicense their code
> > under a license that allows it to be used in proprietary projects. It's
> > just not something that Debian's especially interested in.
>
> ok not LGPL. LGPL is too restrictive comparing to CDDL. With LGPL one
> will not be forced to contribute its changes back. But with CDDL - you
> must contribute your changes back. It works similar to GPL but on
> per-file basis.
I think you need to reread the LGPL. If dpkg was relicensed under the
LGPL, any modification to the dpkg code would still require
modifications to be released in source form. However, it could still be
used as a component in proprietary products, and people *don't want
that*.
> If we could convince them that CDDL license is good enough to not give
> their work to proprietary projects and that proprietary paying workers
> will be forced to contribute back(under CDDL-terms), than they might
> accept dpkg to be dual CDDL-GPL. Maybe.
In this respect, the LGPL and the CDDL are pretty much the same. Both
permit code to be used in proprietary products while requiring that any
changes to the licensed code be available.
--
Matthew Garrett | mjg59@srcf.ucam.org
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