On Friday 10 November 2006 20:16, Les Mikesell wrote: > On Fri, 2006-11-10 at 19:41 +0100, Kern Sibbald wrote: > > > > > > Is a non-free version a big issue for you? I've always been a big fan > > > of perl's dual-license approach which effectively removes the > > > restrictions > > > of the GPL while allowing it to co-exist with GPL'd components. I think > > > it's been a good thing for everyone. > > > > > > > I'm not aware of what Perl's dual license is. If it is something like what > > MySQL does, i.e. offer special versions for a price, then I'm not very > > enthousiastic about that kind of model for Bacula. > > The other one is called the 'Artistic' license and is very BSD-like in > permitting unrestricted distribution. By allowing your choice of > distribution license terms it cleverly avoids the trap of prohibiting > useful combinations with either gpl'd or non-gpl'd code. Someone can > make a commercial version of perl and not distribute source, but they > can't prohibit anyone else from continuing to distribute under the > GPL - and there are no issues with linking with commercial libraries > like database clients.
Thanks for the clarification of the dual Perl license. For something like Perl their license probably works quite well. However, in the case of Bacula, were it a BSD or other totally non-tit-for-tat license, I am convinced some commercial firm would snap it up and pocket millions selling it rebranded with a new snazzy front-end. This is not something I would like to see. > > > Nor would I like to see > > some Venture Capital effort come along and snap up Bacula as they have done > > for Amanda. I also don't particularly like the BSD licenses as they don't > > require a "tit for a tat" as Linus calls it. > > That's a matter of religion, I guess. I see enough examples of free > code and products like X, NFS, firefox, openoffice and java that would > never have been started if GPL had been a requirement that I can't > believe the requirement is necessary or even a good thing. It seems to me that you are mixing terms slightly by implying that X, NFS, firefox, ... are free code and that GPLed code is not free (anyway that is how I read the above). I can see there are clear differences in the licenses, but unless you are interested in building commercial software around free code, I don't see any disadvantage to the GPL. > But, I > personally think that the existence of OS-X is a good thing even > if all of it's code does not make it back to freebsd - opinions > will differ about that. > I believe everyone should be able to chose his/her license. In my case, I believe in the current GPL license that Bacula is using -- at least for Bacula. Were this a small project, I would probably put the code in the Public Domain as I have previously done with small projects. In any case, the current subject (or no subject) is who the copyright holder is going to be. There is no planned change in the license. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Using Tomcat but need to do more? Need to support web services, security? Get stuff done quickly with pre-integrated technology to make your job easier Download IBM WebSphere Application Server v.1.0.1 based on Apache Geronimo http://sel.as-us.falkag.net/sel?cmd=lnk&kid=120709&bid=263057&dat=121642 _______________________________________________ Bacula-users mailing list Bacula-users@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/bacula-users
