On 16 June 2015 at 19:10, Sergio Fernández <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi Rob, > > thanks for jumping in the discussion, all points of view are welcomed. > > I'll answer you inline. > > On Mon, Jun 15, 2015 at 10:27 AM, Rob Vesse <[email protected]> wrote: > >> Note that Apache projects are allowed to rely on LGPL libraries provided >> they are optional dependencies >> >> http://www.apache.org/legal/resolved.html#optional >> >> So if most users won't want/need RDF/HT (which I strongly suspect is the >> case) then it would be perfectly fine to have the RDF/HT parser module >> rely on the Java HDT library provided that Marmotta users have to manually >> opt-in to enabling RDF/HT support and it isn't included by default >> > > That could be right if we would want to use such dependency. But knowing > the licensing issue, the goal of MARMOTTA-593 was always "the mplementation > of RDF HDT from scratch". Therefore what Junyue was asking about > "inspiring" himself with that code we are in a completely different > scenario. So, in that context, we are actually out of the clauses that LGPL > provides for the usage as library, and we directly jump in the GPL clauses > as derived work. And that's the IP issue here now. > > Btw the "don't look at it" argument has always seemed dumb to me since >> when you get down to it there are only so many ways to do things >> particularly when you are implementing a formal specification like this. >> This is especially true in the case of binary formats where the low level >> code is always going to boil down to something along the lines of "try to >> read next N bytes, interpret those bytes appropriately" so the only real >> differences will be in the higher level APIs you wrap over it >> > > Could sound dumb, but legally it's the only safe way. > > However I would suggest posting a thread on legal-discuss@ to get >> clarification for people better versed in the legal issues involved >>
Hi Sergio, > I think that's the best idea. I'd prefer the mentor of the project (Peter) > takes care about dealing with this issue. But if he is busy and can't do > it, I'll ask tomorrow. I have not yet subscribed to the legal mailing list, but if there was a response since Junyue's query there, I will find it in an archive and respond to it. I am no more of an expert than anyone else, but my intention was definitely to have a completely new implementation, but we may not have communicated that clearly enough. Thanks, Peter
