Also, keep in mind that only the enterprise components of Neo4j are AGPL, the community edition, which I believe is the most interesting part here, is GPL.
/peter Cheers, /peter neubauer G: neubauer.peter S: peter.neubauer P: +46 704 106975 L: http://www.linkedin.com/in/neubauer T: @peterneubauer Graph database introduction book for the uninitiated - http://graphdatabases.com Neo4j questions? Please use SO - http://stackoverflow.com/search?q=neo4j On Mon, Mar 11, 2013 at 9:22 AM, René Peinl <rene.pe...@hof-university.de>wrote: > Dear Apache legal advisors, dear Shindig developers, > as you can see from the discussion below, we have a possible license > conflict between AGPL and APL v2. > We want to integrate code that uses neo4j, a graph database which is > licensed under AGPL, into Shindig. From my perspective it is not necessary > to include any neo4j binaries nor code, but I'm not sure how this affects > compilability. Maybe we can only use the REST API then and don't offer to > run neo4j in embedded mode. > I'm not a lawyer nor a licensing specialist, so please advise on how to > proceed. Maybe we can find a workaround that ensures we are conforming to > the licensing terms and still get the new functionality into Shindig. > One suggestion that seems a good one was to check how Apache Camel deals > with this issue. > Regards and many thanks for clarification in advance > René > > -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- > Von: Ate Douma [mailto:a...@douma.nu] > Gesendet: Montag, 11. März 2013 08:49 > An: dev@shindig.apache.org > Cc: Peter Neubauer > Betreff: Re: Review Request: Alternative database backend based on graph > database neo4j > > On 03/10/2013 11:59 PM, Matt Franklin wrote: > > On Sunday, March 10, 2013, wrote: > > > >> Thanks for the insight Ate. > >> > >> Rene, I think we should take Ate's suggestion and send an email to > >> legal-discussion@ (please CC shindig-dev@). If they say it is OK > >> than we continue the discussion about integrating the patch. > > > > Although the answer from Peter Neubauer / neotechnology is accommodating on > this matter and seems to indicate *they* might think this is not a problem, > reading the AGPL [1] license tells me something differently. > I definitely would like this contribution to be acceptable, but we must be > very sure we're not opening a can of worms here. > > > > > I agree that legal should be consulted if we intent to ship a war or > > other archive with any neo4j (or other agpl) licensed binaries included. > I don't think we can do that anyway. AGPL is a variant of GPL, and we're > not > allowed, by ASF policy, to distribute any GPL artifact. > > > > > As a first mitigation step, why don't we make this a separate maven > > module and only ship the source and non-inclusive jar? It should not > > be a problem to ship a jar and source that only references the neo4j > > libs as runtime dependencies. > That might be a possibility to investigate. As Chris noted in another > email, > it might be doable as Camel seemingly also has a neo4j component. > > But also note: it will also depend on the type of reference such an > optional > module uses. If it requires explicit Java imports and direct usage of the > neo4j APIs, this might qualifies as what is called in the AGPL > 'Corresponding Source'. > Especially as neo4j and Shindig provide and expect 'Remote Network > Interaction' > for which the AGPL is especially created to enforce its license to > downstream users. IMO this can lead to a conflict with the AS2.0 license, > to > possibly not even be allowed distribution under that license from within > the > ASF, or not even its sources be checked into svn... > > But IANAL so indeed this should be run through legal-discuss@ first. > > [1] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.html > > > > > > > > >> > >> > >> On Mar 9, 2013, at 7:56 AM, René Peinl <rene.pe...@hof-university.de> > >> wrote: > >> > >>> Dear Ate, > >>> thanks for your comments. I already thought about this and asked the > >> guys from neo technologies. Here is the answer from Peter Neubauer. > >>> > >>> in principle (IANAL) it is ok to have ALv2 licensed code binding to > >>> GPL > >> code. In runtime, the user will not be shielded from the GPL core, > >> which means the runtime will have GPL characteristics when you plug in > Neo4j. > >> That is exactly the intent, and should be ok. The bindings-code is > >> development-time Apache license, regarding contributions and > >> copyright etc, so I think this should be ok. > >>> > >>> I'm not quite sure if that answers your question. I can further > >> investigate if necessary. > >>> Regards > >>> René > >>> > >>> -----Ursprüngliche Nachricht----- > >>> Von: Ate Douma [mailto:a...@douma.nu] > >>> Gesendet: Freitag, 8. März 2013 14:18 > >>> An: dev@shindig.apache.org > >>> Betreff: Re: Review Request: Alternative database backend based on > >>> graph > >> database neo4j > >>> > >>> Just from the peanut gallery, but neo4j is AGPL licensed. > >>> Normally any database backend access which is abstracted away behind > >> 'plain' > >>> JDBC interfaces are allright to use, commercial versions or > >>> otherwise > >> licensed, because the end-user would have the option to choose > >> whatever > >> (compatible) database they want to use. > >>> > >>> However with neo4j this seems different. Even with only optional > >>> support > >> for neo4j, the neo4j integration might require explicit neo4j (Java) > >> APIs and dependencies? I haven't reviewed the code for this, but if > >> it imports neo4j APIs then their AGPL license can be too invasive and > >> then possibly not acceptable for uses within our AL2.0 licensed > codebase. > >>> Or even if that could be allowed, I would make sure to check and ask > >> (legal-discuss@ etc.) if it would be acceptable from ASF policy POV. > >>> > >>> Regards, Ate > >>> > >>> On 03/07/2013 07:46 PM, Henry Saputra wrote: > >>>> This is good news. > >>>> > >>>> One immediate comment is about the package name. > >>>> Would it be possible to put it under org.apache.shindig rather than > >>>> the de.hofuniversity? > >>>> > >>>> This would make the contributions uniform like from other companies > >>>> and organizations. > >>>> > >>>> - Henry > >>>> > >>>> > >>>> 2013/3/6 René Peinl <rene.pe...@hof-university.de> > >>>> > >>>>> > >>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------- > >>>>> This is an automatically generated e-mail. To reply, visit: > >>>>> https://reviews.apache.org/r/9773/ > >>>>> ----------------------------------------------------------- > >>>>> > >>>>> Review request for shindig. > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>> Description > >>>>> ------- > >>>>> > >>>>> Review for Shindig-1911 > >>>>> Alternative database backend based on graph database neo4j Any > >>>>> comments welcome. We are committed to further improve this. > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>> This addresses bug Shindig-1911. > >>>>> https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/Shindig-1911 > >>>>> > >>>>> > >>>>> Diffs > >>>>> ----- > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/pom.xml PRE-CREATION > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/src/main/java/de/hofuniversity/iisys/gra > >>>>> phb > >>>>> ackend/Constants.java > >>>>> PRE-CREATION > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/src/main/java/de/hofuniversity/iisys/gra > >>>>> phb > >>>>> ackend/GraphAPIModule.java > >>>>> PRE-CREATION > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/src/main/java/de/hofuniversity/iisys/gra > >>>>> phb > >>>>> ackend/GraphConfig.java > >>>>> PRE-CREATION > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/src/main/java/de/hofuniversity/iisys/gra > >>>>> phb > >>>>> ackend/GuiceModule.java > >>>>> PRE-CREATION > >>>>> > >>>>> /trunk/java/neo4j-backend/src/main/java/de/hofuniversity/iisys/gra > >>>>> phb > >>>>> acke > > > > > >
