Hello all I'm Martin Desruisseaux, a former GeoTools 2 contributor and now a developer of the Geotoolkit.org project (http://www.geotoolkit.org).
In our search for a community, we had a recent discussion with members of the Apache Spatial Information System project (http://incubator.apache.org/sis/), which is in incubation. A small email exchange gave me the feeling that our design goals could be in phase. We would like to offer them the Geotoolkit.org code. In order to make that possible, we need OSGeo permission to re-license Geotoolkit.org from its current LGPL 2.1 license to the more permissive Apache license. The proposal is not to transfer the totality of Geotoolkit.org to Apache SIS, but to allow them to review the code and pick-up whatever they wish on a case-by-case basis. The transition to Apache SIS would probably be slow and very progressive. Geotoolkit.org is a fork of GeoTools 2.6 followed by 4 years of developments. The project contains two parts: "core" and "pending". Our proposal is to begin with the "core" part, which include material derived from the following GeoTools 2.6 modules: * utilities * metadata * referencing * core of coverage (excluding I/O) * many (but not all) Swing widgets In 2008 those modules were written (according SVN history) at 95% by myself, Geomatys or IRD institute. The remaining 5% were written by other GeoTools contributors. To my knowledge, everyone signed the copyright assignment on http://download.osgeo.org/osgeo/legal/ which grants copyright to OSGeo. However because the GeoTools community may have vested interest in this re-licensing decision, I wish to ask on this mailing list. I would like to emphases that this is not a demand for relicensing current GeoTools, but only relicensing of the GeoTools 2.6 code from which "Geotidy" (the Geotoolkit.org precursor) is derived, which is 4 years old. If the community accepts to grant us the permission to relicense 100% of Geotoolkit.org "core", that would be truly appreciated. But in case of objection, we are willing to rewrite the 5% of "core" code which was not written by myself, Geomatys or IRD. It the community accepts re-licensing, this would allows Apache SIS to gain services they are currently missing, allows Geotoolkit.org code base to gain a community, and possibly allows the GeoTools project to gain a metadata and referencing library maintained by a trusted foundation, which could complete or replace the current referencing module as GeoTools wish. The Geotk referencing module got 4 years of extensive development since our departure, and has capabilities which are - to my knowledge - unique in the open source world. Regards, Martin Desruisseaux ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Live Security Virtual Conference Exclusive live event will cover all the ways today's security and threat landscape has changed and how IT managers can respond. Discussions will include endpoint security, mobile security and the latest in malware threats. http://www.accelacomm.com/jaw/sfrnl04242012/114/50122263/ _______________________________________________ GeoTools-Devel mailing list GeoTools-Devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/geotools-devel
