Re: lprng license
On 29 Jan 1999, John Hasler wrote:
> David Starner quotes:
> > LPRng is distributed under the GNU software license for
> > non-commercial use, the Artistic License for limited com=AD
> > mercial use. Commerical support and licensing is avail=AD
> > able through Patrick Powell <papowell@sdsu.edu>.
>
> And writes:
> > What's so strange? How I understand it is that you can use it under the
> > GPL or Artistic License. If you need support or want to include it in a
> > program without following the Artistic or GPL, then email him and he'll
> > hook you up - probably for a hefty fee. Still, completely DFSG-free.
>
> He is letting us chose one of three licenses: The GPL modified to forbid
> commercial use, the Artistic modified to forbid all but "limited"
> commmercial use, and a privately negotiated custom license. Very non-free.
>
> I suspect that he labors under the delusion that the GPL intrinsicly
> forbids commercial use. He is quite wrong. It does not apply to use at
> all.
My reading of his license is this:
LPRng is distributed under *either* the terms of the GPL (which, you will
find forces you to only use it non-commercially) *or* the terms of the
Artistic license (which, you will find, gives you some limited ability to
use it commercially), *or* by special arrangement with the author.
Now, I agree that he is 'wrong' about the parenthetical phrases (although,
it does depend what he means by commercial - the GPL distributing modified
versions commercially binary-only, which could be what he means) -
however, I didn't read his license as trying to 'modify' the licenses as
John says. Although I can certainly see why John read it that way.
I suggest emailing him for clarification, anyhow...
Jules
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