Re: Releasing under a different liberal license?
On 14/10/10 23:06, Miriam Ruiz wrote:
> Hi,
>
> There's some old code I am working on, but which unfortunately is not
> supported by upstream anymore. Thus, I've decided to become the new
> upstream and make the code evolve myself. The original license says
> hat:
>
> Permission to use, copy, and distribute this software and its
> documentation for any purpose with or without fee is hereby granted,
> provided that the above copyright notice appear in all copies.
>
> Permission to distribute binaries including jfs-files for any purpose
> is hereby granted.
>
> This software is provided "as is" without express or implied warranty.
>
> Some time ago, I wrote to the original upstream asking for
> clarification of the license:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'm interested in your program JFS2, even though it is
>> unmaintained now. I just have a doubt regarding the
>> license of the program:
>>
>> Permission to use, copy, and distribute this
>> software and its
>> documentation for any purpose with or without fee
>> is hereby granted,
>> provided that the above copyright notice appear in
>> all copies.
>>
>> Permission to distribute binaries including
>> jfs-files for any purpose
>> is hereby granted.
>>
>> This software is provided "as is" without express
>> or implied warranty.
>>
>> Does the license include permission to modify the code
>> and redistribute the modified program?
>>
>> Also, does this license covers the contents of
>> jfsdoc204.tar.gz too?
>>
>> Thanks in advance,
>> Miry
> And I received a very clarifying answer:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> Regarding the license of JFS2.
>>
>> The intension with the license was: you can use the program and its
>> documentation any way you want, as long as you don't try to take control
>> over (copyright) the program (I should y have releases it under a
>> GNU-lincense). So the answer to your questions is:
>>
>>> Does the license include permission to modify the code
>>> and redistribute the modified program?
>> Yes. You are welcome to modify the code and redistribute the modified code.
>>
>>> Also, does this license covers the contents of
>>> jfsdoc204.tar.gz too?
>> Yes. You can use the documentation any way you want.
>>
>> Best regards
>> Jan
> Upstream seems not to be reachable anymore, the original web site has
> disappeared ( http://inet.uni2.dk/~jemor/jfs.htm ) and I think that
> his email address at that domain might be too. I have been evolving
> and cleaning the code for a couple of weeks (
> http://repo.or.cz/w/jfs-fuzzy.git ), but I'd like to release my
> version with a more standard license (I'm thinking about BSD-2 or MIT)
> before uploading the package to Debian.
>
> My question is then, can I release my derivative version of the
> software under a BSD-2 or MIT license (respecting the original
> copyright statements, of course)?
>
> Lots of thanks,
> Miry
>
>
That actually looks very like a BSD/MIT licence to me. So I guess you
could release your version as BSD.
If upstream has disappeared, it would be courtesy to keep the original
version, with original licence, available next to your improved version.
Cheers,
Wol
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