Hello, Posting the debian-legal original post link here for easy reference: https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2023/06/msg00019.html
Best, Alexandru ------- Original Message ------- On Thursday, June 22nd, 2023 at 4:46 PM, Alexandru Mihail <alexandru_mih...@protonmail.ch> wrote: > Hello Nicholas, > Hehe, thanks a lot :D > > > Wow, you are good at this! :D > > I mailed debian-legal and am waiting for a reply. > Cheers, > Alex > > ------- Original Message ------- > On Wednesday, June 21st, 2023 at 9:52 PM, Nicholas D Steeves > nstee...@gmail.com wrote: > > > > > Hi Alexandru, > > > > Thanks for the ping. I had forgotten that I had a WIP draft. > > > > Alexandru Mihail alexandru_mih...@protonmail.ch writes: > > > > > > > remember the original NCSA httpd licence. P.S. It feels like > > > > > archaeology to find missing documentation for something from the > > > > > > > dawn of > > > > > > Eureka ! > > > I present the original NCSA httpd license in its purest form after some > > > software archeology: > > > https://web.archive.org/web/20060830015540/http://hoohoo.ncsa.uiuc.edu/docs-1.5/Copyright.html > > > > Wow, you are good at this! :D > > > > > (NCSA HTTPd Development Team / ht...@ncsa.uiuc.edu / Last Modified > > > 08-01-95) > > > ====================== LICENSE START =========================== > > > NCSA HTTPd Server > > > Software Development Group > > > National Center for Supercomputing Applications > > > University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign > > > 605 E. Springfield, Champaign IL 61820 > > > ht...@ncsa.uiuc.edu > > > > > > Copyright (C) 1995, Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois > > > > > > NCSA HTTPd software, both binary and source (hereafter, Software) is > > > copyrighted by The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois (UI), > > > and ownership remains with the UI. > > > > > > The UI grants you (hereafter, Licensee) a license to use the Software > > > for academic, research and internal business purposes only, without a > > > fee. > > > > Hmm, the above grant looks like it may not be DFSG compatible. Do you > > see how? > > > > https://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines > > or https://wiki.debian.org/DebianFreeSoftwareGuidelines > > or with a story > > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debian_Free_Software_Guidelines > > > > > Licensee may distribute the binary and source code (if released) to third > > > parties provided that the copyright notice and this statement appears on > > > all copies and that no charge is associated with such copies. > > > > If Rob McCool didn't ever relicense the part of NCSA HTTPd that is part > > of mini-httpd, then it looks like we might need to provide this notice, > > and upstream mini-httpd should have been doing so. > > > > > Licensee may make derivative works. However, if Licensee distributes any > > > derivative work based on or derived from the Software, then Licensee will > > > (1) notify NCSA regarding its distributing of the derivative work, and > > > (2) clearly notify users that such derivative work is a modified version > > > and not the original NCSA HTTPd Server software distributed by the UI by > > > including a statement such as the following: > > > > > > "Portions developed at the National Center for Supercomputing > > > Applications at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign." > > > > Is this DFSG compatible? > > > > > Any Licensee wishing to make commercial use of the Software should > > > contact the UI, c/o NCSA, to negotiate an appropriate license for such > > > commercial use. Commercial use includes (1) integration of all or part of > > > the source code into a product for sale or license by or on behalf of > > > Licensee to third parties, or (2) distribution of the binary code or > > > source code to third parties that need it to utilize a commercial product > > > sold or licensed by or on behalf of Licensee. > > > > And is this DFSG compatible? > > > > > Any commercial company wishing to use the software as their commercial > > > World Wide Web server and are not redistributing the software need not > > > commercially license the software but can use it free of charge. > > > > and this? Note the clause "and are not redistributing the software". > > So you can't sell copies of this software? > > > > > Should we include a mention of this under debian/copyright stating > > > something along the lines of 'parts of mini_httpd.c under NCSA HTTPD > > > and include a copy of the license somewhere? > > > > Most likely, yes, but the bigger issue is if this license is not > > DFSG-compatible. > > > > > As far as I could dig, this is the license which should be attributed in > > > our case. This is the 1.15 htttpd license, and with 99.9999% certainty, > > > this was the chunk of code still found in mini_httpd.c. The logic is, > > > NCSA httpd had, historically, two licenses (chronologically): one open > > > and one proprietary. mini_httpd is a fork of the open one, that we can be > > > sure of. I think there is little reason to involve debian-legal at this > > > point. > > > What's your opinion here? > > > > Thank you for the note about this history. I didn't know NCSA httpd had > > two licenses. I wonder if there was later a change to "everything that > > was 'open' is now permissively licensed" at some point? > > > > If the chunk of code is still big enough and original enough to meet the > > minimum threshold for originality, then yes, the original copyright and > > license would apply; however, I think this would mean that we need to > > find documentation that someone contacted the U of I (and/or Rob > > McCool). > > > > A quick query of tldrlegal shows an NCSA license that is shorter and > > more permissive: > > https://www.tldrlegal.com/license/university-of-illinois-ncsa-open-source-license-ncsa > > > > I suspect that NCSA httpd may have been relicensed to this shorter > > version. Yeah, this seems to be a case where it's worth contacting > > debian-legal, especially given those bits that don't look very > > DFSG-free. > > > > On the upside, I'm almost totally certain that that mini-httpd will be > > ready to upload after this issue is resolved! > > > > Regards, > > Nicholas
