Re: C-FSL: a new license for software from elstel.org
> 3. It is your obligation that the changed version of your sources will
> be available to the public for free. Available for free means that there
> will be no undue hinderance in obtaining the given item like a
> registration of the person who wants to download or obtain the given
> item. Available for free also means that you must not charge for the
> given item itself apart from the possibility to require a reasonable
> charge for the physical reproduction of the data.
Disallowing selling of the source code makes this licence non-Free.
The GPL disallows selling of the source code as separate from the
binary, but it allows selling of the source code by itself or the
source code with a binary. Also, disallowing requiring registration
seems a bit over-restrictive, not sure if it would be considered
non-Free by Debian, though. And you misspelt hindrance.
> 4. You are allowed to issue an 'automatic derivation process' on the
> source code which will result in so called 'object code'. As soon as you
> wanna share the object code with other people you are oblidged to make
> all utilities and data necessary to obtain the object code either
> availabel under C-FSL or any other open source license approved by
> opensource.org. The given data and utilities need to be available to
> the public for free.
This might violate the 'License Must Not Contaminate Other Software'
part of the DFSG: 'The license must not place restrictions on other
software that is distributed along with the licensed software. For
example, the license must not insist that all other programs
distributed on the same medium must be free software.'. Also, 'wanna'
is informal, and you misspelt 'obliged' and 'available'.
> 5. When appyling changes to the source code you need to leave your name,
> your email address and the date of your modifications so that other
> people may contact you.
Requiring people to leave their name is a violation of their right to
privacy/anonymity. And requiring someone to leave his email address is
inconvenient; not everyone has an email address and they should not be
forced to have one to modify your software. Not sure if this is a
violation of the DFSG, though. Also, another typo: 'appyling'.
> If your program has a graphical user interface the whole C-FSL
> license as well as in case of a fork a complete reference to the
> base product including email address and web presence must be
> accesssible via the GUI.
What does it mean for the 'web presence' to be accessible via the GUI?
Does this mean I have to make it so people can click on the link and
it will open in the web browser, or does it just mean that I have to
give the web address? Also, another typo: 'accesssible'; and after
that, a misspelt word: 'aformentioned' (should be 'aforementioned').
> 7. Contributing to a work under C-FSL means that you will give a group
> called the 'original authors' a consensus based right to re-license
> your derived work so that it will be available under both licenses: the
> C-FSL and the newly applied license.
This might be a violation of 'Distribution of License': 'The rights
attached to the program must apply to all to whom the program is
redistributed without the need for execution of an additional license
by those parties.'. Also, I do not like the idea of someone being able
to change the licence of my derived work without my permission.
> 8. No work under C-FSL shall be deemed part of an effective measure
> under anti-circumvention laws like under article 11 of the WIPO
> copyright treaty adopted on 1996-12-20 or any similar law. You must
> assert that the right to use, modify, generate object code and
> distribute any software under C-FSL will not be infringed by patent
> claims or similar law. Every contributor grants by the act of
> contributing to a work under C-FSL a non-exclusive, worldwide and
> royalty-free patent license to any prospective contributor or user of
> the given work applicable to all his 'essential patemt claims'. The
> essential patent claims comprise all claims owned or controlled by the
> contributor.
I do not know what this means. Is it saying that the author is
required to give up any patents they have that are relevant to the
software? If it is saying that people are not allowed to use patented
techniques, then this is another thing making it non-Free, by
restricting redistribution. Another typo: 'patemt'.
> Libraries are separated components which link against the given work
> or other components.
I think this should be 'separate', not 'separated'.
> 10. This license is either governed by the Laws of Austria or by the
> laws of any member state of the European Union where the first mentioned
> original author lives or is a resident. Disputes shall be settled by the
> nearest proper court given the home town or location of the first
> original author. If any of the terms stated in this license were not in
> accordance with the law of the country that governs this license all
> other parts of the license shall remain valid.
What if none of the authors live in the EU?
Reply to: