I want to be very clear about the narrowness of the exemplary Apache OpenOffice 
exception.  See the remark below.  And to see how one wends through the 
deliberations around obtaining an exception, 
<https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL-117> is exemplary.  A general 
exploration of <https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/LEGAL/> reveals more 
cases as well as how rare exceptions are.

 - Dennis

-----Original Message-----
From: Dennis E. Hamilton [mailto:orc...@apache.org] 
Sent: Saturday, June 27, 2015 16:56
To: dev@openoffice.apache.org
Subject: Background to Cooperation: ASF/AOO Principles, Policies, Practices

[ ... ]

PRACTICES AND EXCEPTIONS

There are many practices that support how the ASF pursues its mission.  The use 
of mailing lists is one example.  The use of services supported on Apache 
infrastructure is another.

There can be exceptions to policy and deviations among practices.  Exceptions 
tend to be very specific and not generalized.  (I suspect a generalization 
would be a change/amendment of policy and a serious review of any conflicts 
with established principles.)

An example of an exception that is specific to the Apache OpenOffice project is 
the distribution of convenience binaries that have writing-aid plug-ins bundled 
with them that are not themselves under a license that is acceptable for 
source-code releases.  There are a number of specific, delimited provisions 
under which this action is found consistent with Apache principles although it 
is an exception to a general policy.  This practice was only introduced after 
obtaining review and eventual concurrence via the list on which legal and 
license questions are discussed.

<orcmid>
    The narrowness of the exception for these plug-ins is that they
    contain no code, they deliver data in a general format that can
    be used in a well-defined technique, and that they are completely 
    replaceable.  Users can also install additional ones of their 
    choosing and remove/disable the ones that are provided in the 
    binary distributions as a convenience.  It is also the case that, 
    if one inspects the plug-in (using a form of Zip package), one 
    would encounter all applicable license information and there would 
    be no confusion over the license that is specific to them material
    conveyed by a given plug-in. 
</orcmid>

[ ... ]


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