Re: OpenCASCADE ACCEPTED!
On Sat, 2008-06-14 at 11:59 -0500, Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso wrote:
> On 14/06/2008, Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso <jordigh@gmail.com> wrote:
> > So this is what needs to be replaced?
> >
> > http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~quake/triangle.html
>
> So I'm thinking that it's not a bad idea to first ask if he's willing
> to relicense his code with a free license... If he's afraid of
> commercial exploitation, under the GPL perhaps. These requests have to
> be extremely diplomatic. I need some help phrasing the request. I want
> to say something along the lines, of "Hey, your software looks great,
> would you consider freeing it up? Here's why commercial restrictions
> are non-free. Oh, if you refuse, you understand that we're going to
> try to reimplement your software based on the ideas of your published
> papers, as allowed by US copyright law. It would be easier for us if
> you simply allowed your software to be redistributed under a free
> license."
>
> Help?
>
> - Jordi G. H.
>
How about:
Your software looks great, and we have put it in Debian, a free software
distribution. However, its license includes a restriction against
commercial use, which means that it, and OpenCascade, which uses your
software, can not go in the main Debian distribution. Would you
consider relicensing your software to increase its availability?
Debian considers restrictions against commerical use non-free
because ...... Note that other licenses, such as the GPL, can protect
against commerical entities taking over your software [not very well
worded].
We are interested in having this functionality available as free
software. We could develop something from scratch, but obviously we'd
prefer not to!
?
Ross
Personally, I'm pretty sympathetic with people who want to restrict to
non-commercial use. I may not fully understand the reason such
restrictions are considered undesirable.
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