Re: ACL - The Ada Community License

[Brian May <bam@snoopy.apana.org.au>]

So whats the verdict?

I take it that this is neither DFSG or GPL compatable?

On Mon, Jul 29, 2002 at 10:49:14PM -0700, Walter Landry wrote:
> Brian May <bam@snoopy.apana.org.au> wrote:
> > (please CC responses to me thanks; sorry if this has already been
> > raised; I searched the archives but found nothing)

Hopefully mail-followups-to should be correct this time...

Reasons why it is not DFSG:

On Tue, Jul 30, 2002 at 12:14:24PM -0700, Walter Landry wrote:
> Glenn Maynard <g_dlegal@zewt.org> wrote:
> > It's unclear to me what falls under 3 and what falls under 4: it seems
> > as if 3 is for all modification and distribution--it mentions
> > "executables"--and 4 is for distribution of binaries only.  However, 4
> > seems more restrictive than 3; it doesn't have the "freely available"
> > option.  So, I'm a bit confused.
> 
> Hmm.  I see your point.  I think the license is unclear.  I'm not sure
> whether the restrictions in Section 4 are in addition to the
> restrictions in Section 3, or rather Section 4 is an additional option
> for Section 3.  It could be argued either way.  Spelling it out would
> be a good thing.

On Tue, Jul 30, 2002 at 11:23:19PM +0200, Florian Weimer wrote:
> Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu> writes:
> 
> > Selling the library is not forbidden.
> 
> Really?  "You may not charge a fee for this Ada library itself."

On Tue, Jul 30, 2002 at 11:21:38PM +0200, Florian Weimer wrote:
> Brian May <bam@snoopy.apana.org.au> writes:
> 
> >          2  You may apply bug fixes, portability fixes and other
> >             modifications derived from the Public Domain or from
> >             the Copyright Holder. A library modified in such a way
> >             shall still be considered the Standard Version.
> >
> >          3  You may otherwise modify your copy of this Ada library
> >             in any way, provided that you insert a prominent notice
> >             in each changed file stating how and when you changed
> >             that file, and provided that you do at least ONE of the
> >             following:
> 
> This discriminates against people who cannot put copyrighted works
> into the Public Domain.


Reasons why it is not GPL compatable:

> Maybe not.  Section 7 says
> 
> >          7  System-level subroutines supplied by you and linked
> >             into this Ada library in order to emulate the
> >             functionality defined by this Ada library shall not be
> >             considered part of this Ada library, but are the
> >             equivalent of input as in Paragraph 6, provided these
> >             subroutines do not change the library in any way that
> >             would cause it to fail the regression tests for the
> >             library.
> 
> This is similar to the "operating system" exception, except that the
> vendor of the operating system can't do anything that breaks Ada.  For
> example, the Sun libc has pow() defined.  The Ada library might define
> it's own pow() for small integers that does not give bit-wise
> identical results to the Sun pow().  If the Sun one is used, it might
> cause regression tests to fail, meaning that Sun could not distribute
> the Ada library.  The GPL only restricts Sun from distributing libc
> and the Ada library together.  This would count as an additional
> restriction, and thus not compatible with the GPL.
> 
> If you have any influence, changing this part to read more like the
> GPL would be enough to make it compatible.

Reasons why the license has silly mistakes:

On Tue, Jul 30, 2002 at 03:46:22AM -0400, Glenn Maynard wrote:
> >         3  You may otherwise modify your copy of this Ada library
> 
> Should this say "distribute modified copies"?
> 
> >         b) Accompany the distribution with the machine-readable
> >            source of the Ada library with your modifications.
> >            Accompany any non-standard executables with their
> >
> >         c) corresponding Standard Version executables, giving the
> >            non-standard executables non-standard names, and
> >            clearly documenting the differences in manual pages (or
> >            equivalent), together with instructions on where to get
> >            the Standard Version.
> 
> Should this be:
> 
>          b) Accompany the distribution with the machine-readable
>             source of the Ada library with your modifications.
> 
>          c) Accompany any non-standard executables with their
>             corresponding Standard Version executables, giving the
>             non-standard executables non-standard names, and
>             clearly documenting the differences in manual pages (or
>             equivalent), together with instructions on where to get
>             the Standard Version.
-- 
Brian May <bam@snoopy.apana.org.au>