Re: [PECL-DEV] Debian request to change the PHP license for Extensions

On Fri, Jun 27, 2014 at 4:51 PM, Johannes Schlüter <johannes@schlueters.de> wrote:

On Fri, 2014-06-27 at 09:56 +0200, Ferenc Kovacs wrote:
> I think the difference is that we have a couple of clauses which sounds
> weird/makes no sense when the license is used for extensions or anything
> else than php-src, like clause 3, 4 and 6.
> And this is what they were complaining about in the thread referenced from
> their reject faq:
> https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2005/08/msg00128.html

Mind that this refers to PHP license 3.0, version 3.01 slightly changed
the text (essentially s/includes PHP/includes PHP software/) to satisfy
Debian.

Yeah, I figured out that in my latest email.

I agree that the clauses not necessarily make a lot of sense for most
uses, but mind PECL is not only Siberia but also an incubator. Some
extensions start in PECL and eventually move over to the core
distribution. Keeping the license aligned makes this simpler. (While 99%
of the PECL extensions will never be in a PHP release)

I agree that it is a good thing that we have a common license for the core and the extensions, I just think that current text is a bit awkward/clunky when reading it in an extension context.

> > OTOH, I don't think anything really prevents PECL extension authors
> > to dual-license their extensions under whatever Debian would like, if
> > they want so. People that aren't extension authors probably can't do
> > much here though.
> >
>
> Yeah, but maybe we could do something like creating a new version of the
> license which makes it a bit clear, what do we mean by derived work(do we
> consider exts/sapis/etc. derived ork or not),

It is tough to write a good legal document when you want to be precise.
Keeping the current form allows a case by case evaluation. From what
I've heard (never done it myself) the PHP Group was quit gracious on
requests. (only case I remember where they requested a rename was
HardnendPHP)

Keeping it less clear also have negative side effects, like not being allow to enforce it, if the court interprets your text differently than you, and could also keep people from using php or it's license, because they either misinterpret the license, or read some FUD about it, and that text isn't clear enough to allow them to verify the claims.

> removing the "PHP includes
> the Zend Engine, freely available at <http://www.zend.com>." part, as only
> php-src includes the ZE, and it isn't available from zend.com anymore imo.

This would require relicensing the ZendEngine first. Currently
ZendEngine uses the ZendEngine license
https://github.com/php/php-src/blob/master/Zend/LICENSE
So PHP has to fulfill the license's requirements and keep that
reference.
In some casual environment I asked them 5 years ago or so whether they
want to relicense the engine which they rejected. Since I didn't really
care I haven't further investigated.

yes, the Zend License mandates that the acknowledgment must be kept, but I don't think that it would be mandatory to keep it in our license(which can be used by other projects, which may, or may not include the Zend Engine).

> Maybe also rewording the clauses about the written permission is required
> for using the PHP name part to more generic, so projects using the license
> can use it to protect their names.
> Ofc these are just ideas from the top of my head, and IANAL.

We can't forbid using the name outside the scope of the license within
the license. For that we'd have to use trademark law. Getting
international protection for a three letter trademark requires
recognition and legal power of an organisation like BMW.

We could do what other licences do, reference the software which is shipped with the license instead of using the PHP name explicitly, allow the project using the license to define the copyright holder and reference that when requiring to get a written permission from the copyright holder.

that would mean that when you are making a derived work from a software using the PHP license, you aren't allowed to name it after the original software.

--
Ferenc Kovács
@Tyr43l - http://tyrael.hu