To sumarise the licenses:
The GPL is the most restrictive. You can do anything with GPL'd code, but if you distribute products based on it then:
1) You must include the source.
2) You must distribute it under the GPL.
This basically means that anyone who gets to use your software has exactly the same rights over it as you did over the code you used as a base. If you don't distribute the code (you keep it in-house) then the GPL is fine.
The LGPL states (more or less) that the license itself is distributed under the terms of the GPL. Any changes you make to the library must, if distributed, include source and be licensed under the LGPL. You may, however, link to the library without making your code (L)GPL, as long as you allow people to change the version of the library they use. If you dynamically link, this is no problem. If you statically link you must include your .o files so that people can re-link if they wish.
The Apache license is a modified BSD license. Basically you can do anything with the code except:
1) Sue the people who wrote it if it goes wrong
2) Claim you wrote it.
3) Call your program after the one you copied.
You must make sure that the copyright notices are placed in the source, and distributed with any binaries and in any documentation. Beyond that you can do whatever you like with the code.
If you are really lucky, you may find the code you're looking for under the MIT license, which is even more lenient. This only states that you must acknowledge copyright in the source. If you distribute a binary, you don't have to bother (although it is considered polite to do so). About the only thing I can think of that uses this license is XFree86.
Hope this helps.
Tim Anderson wrote:
I need both a server and a client. I'm willing to publish and/or use libraries projects etc. that do the basics of both BUT I have to have a proprietary namespace and handler object with code that won't be published (I hope I'm using the verbiage correctly). So everything is pretty standard fare until the "super secret" message comes flying around. I want to keep the super secret messages and the handler proprietary.
There are a handful of projects out there that could possibly fit the bill but I keep coming back to one problem: Is the handling of a new namspace and the objects required to do so going to be forced into GPL land if I use a GPL'd client/server/library? And what exactly is the difference between LGPL, GPL and Apache licenses? I've really read them all but in typical lawyer speak you can pretty much do anything you want given certain obsfucations of any of the licenses. The Apache license seems the most straight forward but is adding "apache blah blah blah" really all that is needed.
Second, is there a decent Win32 project flying around that would fit the bill? I'm a C/C++ Win32 guy unfortunately. I would be willing to slug out some new public code for doing goofy windows nonsense (like IO completions ports) to boost a win32 server amongst other things as long as I can cover my initial point above.
Am I smoking crack?
Thanks,
Timothy A. Anderson [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ jdev mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mailman.jabber.org/listinfo/jdev
_______________________________________________ jdev mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://mailman.jabber.org/listinfo/jdev
