On Fri, Jul 19, 2013 at 04:29:21PM +0200, Ondřej Surý wrote: > Hi, > > would FOSS Exception similar to > http://www.mysql.com/about/legal/licensing/foss-exception/ fix the > relicensing problem? > > If so, I will propose Oracle developers to add the FOSS Exception to > Berkeley DB licensing. > > The MySQL FOSS Exception doesn't include 4-clause BSD, so it still might > bar some software to create derivative works with Berkeley DB, but the list > would be considerably shorter. Or they will need to add the 4-clause BSD > license to the exception list. Notably, it's also missing the GPL version 2. This isn't a problem for MySQL, since it's already GPLv2, but there's probably quite a bit of software that is GPLv2 that uses Berkeley DB. Also, there is a wide variety of BSD licenses that are incompatible, as you've pointed out. Personally, I think the easiest and best solution is simply to stick with Berkeley DB 5.3. It avoids all the pain of relicensing and the inevitable licensing bugs that *will* show up. Not to mention that some upstreams will be unamused at Oracle's shenanigans and won't want to support BDB 6. -- brian m. carlson / brian with sandals: Houston, Texas, US +1 832 623 2791 | http://www.crustytoothpaste.net/~bmc | My opinion only OpenPGP: RSA v4 4096b: 88AC E9B2 9196 305B A994 7552 F1BA 225C 0223 B187
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