Re: GHC licence
On 21-Jul-1998, Hans Aberg [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 10:38 +0100 98/07/21, Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, but I'm sure you see the intent. The wording "public domain" is not a legal or otherwise well-defined concept, IANAL, but I believe the phrase "public domain" is a well-defined concept. It does not mean why Simon L Peyton Jones means by it, though. If something is public domain, then anyone can use it for anything. so the advice to anybody writing publicly distributed software is claim the copyright, and then specify what rules there should be for its use. Yes, indeed. Copyright law forbids anyone from copying software without the copyright owner's permission (except for certain specific circumstances, e.g. "fair use"). But the conditions should be spelled out in the copyright notice, I think. Definitely. -- Fergus Henderson [EMAIL PROTECTED] | "I have always known that the pursuit WWW: http://www.cs.mu.oz.au/~fjh | of excellence is a lethal habit" PGP: finger [EMAIL PROTECTED]| -- the last words of T. S. Garp.
Re: GHC licence
On 21-Jul-1998, Hans Aberg [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: At 23:28 +1000 98/07/21, Fergus Henderson wrote: I ANAL, but I believe the phrase "public domain" is a well-defined concept. It does not mean why Simon L Peyton Jones means by it, though. If something is public domain, then anyone can use it for anything. I recall from the eighties about what wordings like "public domain", "free-ware" etc really meant, and it turned out that people meant different things. So to be one the sure side, I think ine should the wording "This software is public domain, that is, ...", spelling it out. (By the way, what does the "I ANAL" you use mean?) IANAL stands for "I am not a lawyer". (The space between the "I" and "A" was a typo.) -- Fergus Henderson [EMAIL PROTECTED] | "I have always known that the pursuit WWW: http://www.cs.mu.oz.au/~fjh | of excellence is a lethal habit" PGP: finger [EMAIL PROTECTED]| -- the last words of T. S. Garp.
Re: GHC licence
CC: Simon L Peyton Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED] I do think that the GNU license would be a mistake -- as I understand, it would prevent the use of GHC in commercial projects, and I'm pretty sure that's something Simon wants to *encourage*. -- From: jfk Sent: 21 July 1998 20:20 To: Simon L Peyton Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be t Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, but I'm sure you see the intent. I have carefully avoided getting tangled up in legal red tape, which is why there is no formal license. It may be that my move to Microsoft will force me to spend time sorting this out. But it's never been a problem so far, and I doubt it will in the future, so I'm reluctant to invest the time until pressed to do so. It might be a good idea to publish GHC under the GNU Public License or something similar. It grants everybody the right to use the software for any purpose, including making extensions or modifications of it - as long as the "derived work" is published under GPL as well. This ensures that no company can take the product, make some small modifications to it and call it their own. Whatever you choose to do, I think you need to be more explicit about which rights you grant the users of GHC to avoid unwanted use/misuse by anyone. regards, Joergen
Re: GHC licence
On Wed, 22 Jul 1998 08:51:47 GMT, you wrote: CC: Simon L Peyton Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED] I do think that the GNU license would be a mistake -- as I understand, it would prevent the use of GHC in commercial projects, and I'm pretty sure that's something Simon wants to *encourage*. There are *two* GNU licenses. The GPL is meant for tools, like GHC, and would prevent certain uses of GHC. There is a second GNU license for libraries, called LGPL, and this is important. The runtime components of GHC should be licensed using the library license (just like the GNU runtimes are). Using both licenses appropriately would allow for the use of GHC in commercial software (as long as GHC itself was not included). Any improvements GHC or its runtime would still have to be made public by the commercial entity. For example, Tower Eiffel has use GNU compilers for some time. The runtime libraries of GNU compilers are protected by the library license. Yet Tower Eiffel is certainly used for commercial products. Cheers, Bob --- Bob Hutchison, [EMAIL PROTECTED], (416) 760-0565 ([EMAIL PROTECTED] until INTERNIC fixes problems) RedRock, Toronto, Canada
Re: GHC licence
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I do think that the GNU license would be a mistake -- as I understand, it would prevent the use of GHC in commercial projects, and I'm pretty sure that's something Simon wants to *encourage*. The GPL explicitly allows commercial use. The commercially problematic aspect of the GPL is that derived versions of GPLed software must be distributed with source (and all the intellectual property exposed). This does not propagate to works created using GPLed software. Tony. -- F.A.N.Finch [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] +44-7970-401-426 "Plenty more letters in the alphabet"
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: So far as GHC is concerned, I wrote on this list a month ago: "More specifically, I plan to continue beavering away on GHC. GHC is public domain software, and Microsoft are happy for it to remain so, source code and all. If anything, I'll have quite a bit more time to work on it than before." Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, but I'm sure you see the intent. I have carefully avoided getting tangled up in legal red tape, which is why there is no formal license. It may be that my move to Microsoft will force me to spend time sorting this out. But it's never been a problem so far, and I doubt it will in the future, so I'm reluctant to invest the time until pressed to do so. Simon
Re: GHC licence
At 10:38 +0100 98/07/21, Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, but I'm sure you see the intent. The wording "public domain" is not a legal or otherwise well-defined concept, so the advice to anybody writing publicly distributed software is claim the copyright, and then specify what rules there should be for its use. This way one can prevent abuse. One form of abuse (if not copyrighted) could be that a company takes over the product for commercial purposes, perhaps even copyrighting it itself. A prudent "public domain" definition could be that the product can be used commercially without a charge, but needs the written consent of the copyrighter. Another criteria could be that a commercial versions of the product can be allowed to make money on the commercially added features, or costs for commercial distribution, but not on the product itself. So if a commercial company adds say GUI, then they can charge what is reasonable for that job, but they cannot charge for making use of the source codes. (Just in order to avoid apparent cases of over-charging of the product.) But the conditions should be spelled out in the copyright notice, I think. I am not an expert on legal wrangling, but if the perceived independence is at stake, one way could be to create a consortium and transfer the copyright to that while retaining the right to develop the product. Hans Aberg * Email: Hans Aberg mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * Home Page: http://www.matematik.su.se/~haberg/ * AMS member listing: http://www.ams.org/cml/
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
"Simon" == Simon L Peyton Jones [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: So far as GHC is concerned, I wrote on this list a month ago: "More specifically, I plan to continue beavering away on GHC. GHC is public domain software, and Microsoft are happy for it to remain so, source code and all. If anything, I'll have quite a bit more time to work on it than before." Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) Simon No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely Simon available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money Simon by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, Simon but I'm sure you see the intent. Simon I have carefully avoided getting tangled up in legal red tape, which Simon is why there is no formal license. It may be that my move to Microsoft Simon will force me to spend time sorting this out. But it's never been Simon a problem so far, and I doubt it will in the future, so I'm reluctant Simon to invest the time until pressed to do so. There is a discussion of various free licenses at http://www.debian.org/intro/free As part of the 'social contract' there are also the Debian Free Software Guidelines at http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines Marko
Re: GHC licence
At 23:28 +1000 98/07/21, Fergus Henderson wrote: I ANAL, but I believe the phrase "public domain" is a well-defined concept. It does not mean why Simon L Peyton Jones means by it, though. If something is public domain, then anyone can use it for anything. I recall from the eighties about what wordings like "public domain", "free-ware" etc really meant, and it turned out that people meant different things. So to be one the sure side, I think ine should the wording "This software is public domain, that is, ...", spelling it out. (By the way, what does the "I ANAL" you use mean?) Hans Aberg * Email: Hans Aberg mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] * Home Page: http://www.matematik.su.se/~haberg/ * AMS member listing: http://www.ams.org/cml/
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: Do you mean "public domain" literally, i.e. are you renouncing all copyright? (The source code contains copyright notices, but no licence, as far as I can see.) No I am not renouncing all copyright. By "public domain" I mean freely available for anyone to use for any purpose other than making money by selling the compiler itself. That isn't a formal definition, but I'm sure you see the intent. I have carefully avoided getting tangled up in legal red tape, which is why there is no formal license. It may be that my move to Microsoft will force me to spend time sorting this out. But it's never been a problem so far, and I doubt it will in the future, so I'm reluctant to invest the time until pressed to do so. It might be a good idea to publish GHC under the GNU Public License or something similar. It grants everybody the right to use the software for any purpose, including making extensions or modifications of it - as long as the "derived work" is published under GPL as well. This ensures that no company can take the product, make some small modifications to it and call it their own. Whatever you choose to do, I think you need to be more explicit about which rights you grant the users of GHC to avoid unwanted use/misuse by anyone. regards, Joergen
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
Jorgen Frojk Kjaersgaard [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: It might be a good idea to publish GHC under the GNU Public License or something similar. It grants everybody the right to use the software for any purpose, including making extensions or modifications of it - as long as the "derived work" is published under GPL as well. This ensures that no company can take the product, make some small modifications to it and call it their own. Whatever you choose to do, I think you need to be more explicit about which rights you grant the users of GHC to avoid unwanted use/misuse by anyone. The GNU General Public License is not the only type of "free software" or "open source software" license in use. For information on various types of "open source" licenses, check out the URL http://www.opensource.org. - Conrad Cunningham
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
It might be a good idea to publish GHC under the GNU Public License or something similar. It grants everybody the right to use the software for any purpose, including making extensions or modifications of it - as long as the "derived work" is published under GPL as well. This ensures that no company can take the product, make some small modifications to it and call it their own. Whatever you choose to do, I think you need to be more explicit about which rights you grant the users of GHC to avoid unwanted use/misuse by anyone. Or a non-profit consortium, as someone mentioned it already. I am not in a position to advice, but the example of Bertrand Meyer and his Eiffel language comes to mind so vividly. :-) Originally Eiffel was Bertrand's child. Later he gave all his rights to NICE - Non-profit International (?) Consortium for Eiffel. His greatest worry was to keep Eiffel as a pure, uniform language, without dialects. This seems to work. All decisions on future of Eiffel are voted by voting members, and Bertrand is just one of them. There are several commercial companies that maintain Eiffel compilers and libraries, including Bertrand's own ISE in Santa Barbara. Jan
Re: GHC licence (was Could Haskell be taken over by Microsoft?)
On Tue, 21 Jul 1998, Simon L Peyton Jones wrote: (...) But it's never been a problem so far, and I doubt it will in the future, so I'm reluctant to invest the time until pressed to do so. No need to apologize to a group of haskell fanatics for using lazy evaluation to solve this problem ;) Charles Godin Software engineer Discreet Logic [EMAIL PROTECTED]
