RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
| -Original Message- | From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Beman Dawes | Sent: Friday, June 27, 2003 7:23 PM | To: Boost mailing list; [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Subject: RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License | | | In non-Boost code, I've seen wording something like See the attached | license; if it is missing see www.foo.org/license. Maybe something like | that is what will be recommended. | | They've already signed off on the concept of a single copy of the license. | It is just the exact way to refer to it that hasn't been finalized. | | --Beman May I suggest consideration of what happens in a decade or two when boost.org might not longer exist to provide a reference, but we still need to ensure that the license terms are still available. Would it be best to refer (additionally perhaps) to a Digital Object Identifier (see doi.org) which provides a permanent reference to the actual license file. So if boost.org is renamed, say, the reference is still correct because it will be 'resolved' (in the DOI jargon) to a new location as boostTwo.org. Paul Paul A Bristow, Prizet Farmhouse, Kendal, Cumbria, LA8 8AB UK +44 1539 561830 Mobile +44 7714 33 02 04 Mobile mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
Paul A. Bristow said: | -Original Message- | From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Rene Rivera | Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 8:26 PM | To: Boost mailing list | Subject: Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License | | Spanish is my first, but English is a very close second. | The impression I got is that it's somewhat hard to parse as it is. | | The second paragraph is long; and without any separators other than the commas it's | hard to read. | | Here's an edited version which might be better for non-english readers to | understand: | | | Permission is hereby granted ... snip | all derivative works of the Software. Unless such copies or derivative works | are solely in the form of machine-executable object code generated by a | source language processor. As someone whose first language really is english - unlike the majority of ex-colonial Boosters :-)) I really must protest that the last 'sentence' isn't one! Seriously, overall I think this is excellent. It isn't meant to be read by human beings, only lawyers - and they are used to this stuff. And: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation Looks fine to me, though I prefer Copyright to (C) It looks simple, but would it be legally binding? For instance, say I release my software with this Boost license today, using the above text (and assuming the links point to the license, of course). Now, a year from now something is found to be problematic with the license and the lawyers tweak it. I can see a case being made that existing projects could from that point on be changed to be covered by this new license, but previous releases would seem to have to be legally bound to the license as it existed then. The above links, however, will not refer to this older license, but to the newer license. This seems to make the above scheme a little legally shakey, no? I thought you had to physically include the license with distributions and have the individual file licenses refer to this distributed license? That's obviously a question for the lawyers, as us laymen will only be guessing ;). But it would be nice to just refer to the license instead of repeating it in every single file. -- William E. Kempf ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
On Thursday, Jun 26, 2003, at 07:53 America/Denver, William E. Kempf wrote: ... But it would be nice to just refer to the license instead of repeating it in every single file. Though this license is brief enough that inclusion is no big deal. It seems that doing it by reference to a web page amounts to Boost reserving the right to change terms in the future, possibly to the disadvantage of the authors and users. But I see lots of code that refers to the GPL that way, so this is another question for the lawyers. ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
On Thu, 26 Jun 2003, Paul A. Bristow wrote: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation Looks fine to me, though I prefer Copyright to (C) Paul I have been told by previous employers' lawyers that the word Copyright is in fact required. A claim of copyright must include the word Copyright or the copyright symbol (a circled C), and the year of the copyright. In the US, a capital C in parenthesis does not carry the legal meaning of the word copyright or the copyright symbol. Since ASCII doesn't offer a copyright symbol, we must include the word copyright. However, the same lawyers suggested including both Copyright and (C), as other countries may not accept the word Copyright, but might accept the (C). In any event, this is a really short and easy question for the lawyers. Regards, -Tom Wenisch Computer Architecture Lab Carnegie Mellon University ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 10:27 PM 6/26/2003, Howard Hinnant wrote: On Thursday, June 26, 2003, at 07:51 PM, Beman Dawes wrote: A copyright, unlike a patent, just applies to the actual representation. So unless another implementation actually made a literal copy of the Boost code, the other implementation would not be a derived work of the Boost code and so would not have to follow the Boost license. snip Thanks Beman. That was most informative and useful. Well, do ask a lawyer if you've got any serious copyright questions. The real world is messy. For example, there have been cases (including some involving software) where the copyrighted work wasn't physically copied, but the courts still ruled infringement had occurred. The cases I'm aware of were (1) a book which used the same characters, plot, and many important other aspects as the copyrighted work, (2) a photograph which was set up to mimic a famous copyrighted photo in every respect, and (3) a software program which used the same organization, functional decomposition, algorithms, variable names, etc, etc, etc, as a copyrighted program. In the case of the program, the same programmer wrote the first program for one company, and then moved to another company. Although no physical copy of the source code was involved, the programmer had a good memory, and basically just duplicated the prior effort. --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 09:53 AM 6/26/2003, William E. Kempf wrote: Paul A. Bristow said: And: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation Looks fine to me, though I prefer Copyright to (C) Yes, I do too. The above was meant to be an example; the lawyers will help with the exact wording. It looks simple, but would it be legally binding? For instance, say I release my software with this Boost license today, using the above text (and assuming the links point to the license, of course). Now, a year from now something is found to be problematic with the license and the lawyers tweak it. I can see a case being made that existing projects could from that point on be changed to be covered by this new license, but previous releases would seem to have to be legally bound to the license as it existed then. The above links, however, will not refer to this older license, but to the newer license. This seems to make the above scheme a little legally shakey, no? I thought you had to physically include the license with distributions and have the individual file licenses refer to this distributed license? Yes, those are all issues. In non-Boost code, I've seen wording something like See the attached license; if it is missing see www.foo.org/license. Maybe something like that is what will be recommended. That's obviously a question for the lawyers, as us laymen will only be guessing ;). But it would be nice to just refer to the license instead of repeating it in every single file. They've already signed off on the concept of a single copy of the license. It is just the exact way to refer to it that hasn't been finalized. --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
| -Original Message- | From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Rene Rivera | Sent: Wednesday, June 25, 2003 8:26 PM | To: Boost mailing list | Subject: Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License | | Spanish is my first, but English is a very close second. | The impression I got is that it's somewhat hard to parse as it is. | | The second paragraph is long; and without any separators other than the commas it's | hard to read. | | Here's an edited version which might be better for non-english readers to | understand: | | | Permission is hereby granted ... snip | all derivative works of the Software. Unless such copies or derivative works | are solely in the form of machine-executable object code generated by a | source language processor. As someone whose first language really is english - unlike the majority of ex-colonial Boosters :-)) I really must protest that the last 'sentence' isn't one! Seriously, overall I think this is excellent. It isn't meant to be read by human beings, only lawyers - and they are used to this stuff. And: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation Looks fine to me, though I prefer Copyright to (C) Paul Paul A Bristow, Prizet Farmhouse, Kendal, Cumbria, LA8 8AB UK +44 1539 561830 Mobile +44 7714 33 02 04 Mobile mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
Thanks Beman, No, including the Boost license doesn't make your source open. There is nothing in either the new or old Boost licenses which requires that source code be redistributed or otherwise made available. I understand the intention and realize that this is the way it has always been. It is wonderful to have great work like boost at the finger tips. Is my work a derivate work?, I guess is the gist of the question. How do you firewall it? Does a contract with a third party need to address the boundary of boost code (which maybe modified and embedded or not) and the proprietary code. When you cut-and-paste a bit of copyrighted code into your own code, you've created a derived work of the copyrighted code. That's the way copyright law works, even if your code is really large and the cut-and-paste copyright code is fairly trivial. (Under some circumstances copying a small portion can be considered fair use, but that is starting to drift off-topic.) If a work is a derivate work and you do redistribute, sell or otherwise license your own proprietary _source_ what is the impact of including the following statement? __ Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person or organization obtaining a copy of the software covered by this license (the Software) to use, reproduce, display, distribute, execute, and transmit the Software, and to prepare derivative works of the Software, and to permit third-parties to whom the Software is furnished to do so, all subject to the following __ If I have the desire to license source code, which uses boost code, to a third party, on the basis that my code may not be redistributed then this statement confuses the issue if I am a derivative work. For example, I build a risk system for an asset manager. I use some boost, perhaps modified. I include the license as required... and I get confused trying to separate the consequences in a contract with the third party. I had one such messy contract that took over a year to resolve to mutual agreement :-( Perhaps this is a non issue as the issue may exist for alternative licenses. If you desire to have your derivative work under a different umbrella for source distribution then the issue seems significant to me. Cheers, Matt. PS: does #include boost/any_old_header.hpp make you a derived work? ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 07:35 AM 6/26/2003, Matt Hurd wrote: Is my work a derivate work?, I guess is the gist of the question. How do you firewall it? Does a contract with a third party need to address the boundary of boost code (which maybe modified and embedded or not) and the proprietary code. Serious answers to those questions are way too complex for an email reply. I'm not qualified in any case. Your best bet is to buy a book on the topic. Perhaps Copyright Your Software by Stephen Fishman. See http://www.nolo.com/lawstore/products/product.cfm/ObjectID/991DEF76-7EAC-402F-A36984BEADE9DB53 (I haven't read it. I've got an older book, How to Copyright Software by MJ Salone, from the same publisher, but it is now out-of-print. It is available used on Amazon.) __ If I have the desire to license source code, which uses boost code, to a third party, on the basis that my code may not be redistributed then this statement confuses the issue if I am a derivative work. For example, I build a risk system for an asset manager. I use some boost, perhaps modified. I include the license as required... and I get confused trying to separate the consequences in a contract with the third party. I had one such messy contract that took over a year to resolve to mutual agreement :-( Perhaps this is a non issue as the issue may exist for alternative licenses. I think other licenses have the same problem. I ran into it years before Boost, and solved it by keeping the open-source code clearly separated from the proprietary (and actually delivered on separate disks, to emphasize the difference.) The proprietary code used the open-source code, but was not derived from the open-source code. Use is one thing, derivation is another. PS: does #include boost/any_old_header.hpp make you a derived work? No. That is use, but not derivation. But if instead of #include, you pasted in a legally significant portion of boost/any_old_header.hpp, that would make your program a derived work. Note that if you pasted in code from several sources, your code might become a derived work of each of those sources. HTH, --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 09:18 AM 6/26/2003, Howard Hinnant wrote: Since boost is a spring board for standardization of a library, I'm wondering if the boost license requires the copyright notice to follow for other implementations which follow the interface of the boost library, but independently develop the implementation? A copyright, unlike a patent, just applies to the actual representation. So unless another implementation actually made a literal copy of the Boost code, the other implementation would not be a derived work of the Boost code and so would not have to follow the Boost license. This has already happened; the Dinkumware CoreX threads library follows the Boost.Threads interface. But because they implemented from scratch, they didn't have to reproduce the copyright or license. Now you might ask, what about the interface, doesn't the copyright cover that too? The answer is no, as has been fought out in court several times. Ask a lawyer for details, but interfaces themselves aren't covered by copyright. The docs are covered, the header is covered, the implementation, test cases, etc, are all covered, but not the conceptual interface. In other words, if we standardize a boost library, will the library's copyright notice have to be in all implementations of that std::lib? No, because the standard won't copy the actual library code. The standard may copy actual prose wording from the proposal, and that in turn may have been derived from the library's documentation, but the proposer will have to assign the copyright to ISO on any portion of the wording that reaches the actual standard document. At one time some of us who wrote text for the standard actually had to sign a copyright assignment to ISO, but then IIRC ISO just decided they automatically became the copyright holder by some sort of international treaty eminent domain, and stopped actually asking for a written assignment. Will the copyright need to appear in the standard itself? Not normally. There are three exceptions in the current standard, if you look at 1.10. So much of the standard wording came from three books by Stroustrup, Kernigahan Ritchie, and Plauger that a special deal was cut with them. The three short paragraphs in 1.10 took a long time to negotiate. Another aspect of standardization is that anyone who proposes something for standardization has to publicly announce if it is covered by a patent. There was a recent court case (something about hardware memory IIRC) where the proposer waited until after something got standardized, and then said you now owe my company royalties if you implement the standard. The judge invalidated the patent. It would have been perfectly valid if the proposer had pre-announced the existence of the patent. --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
On Thursday, June 26, 2003, at 07:51 PM, Beman Dawes wrote: A copyright, unlike a patent, just applies to the actual representation. So unless another implementation actually made a literal copy of the Boost code, the other implementation would not be a derived work of the Boost code and so would not have to follow the Boost license. snip Thanks Beman. That was most informative and useful. -Howard ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 01:27 PM 6/25/2003, Paul Mensonides wrote: * Boost developers; if there are aspects of the license that make you hesitate about adopting it, what are the issues? It looks fine to me Beman. Is this license (once it is completely ironed out) supposed to go in each file? The license is worded so that it works either in each file or separately. My preference is for there to be a single license file in the boost root directory, and each file covered include a link. So a source code file might contain something like: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation I'm not sure everyone agrees with that approach - part of the reason for discussion is to finalize that. The exact wording of the See ... for license ... is yet to be decided. We will follow the lawyers advice, in any case. If so, where do you put the credentials for who created what? Or do we leave that out altogether? Each file still needs to carry a copyright, as in the past. I probably should have mentioned that Diane Cabell and her helpers see several additional legal issues Boost should deal with in addition to the license. One of those has to do with legal aspects of who created what. But while those issues are starting to come into focus, they are not ready for full discussion yet. --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
[2003-06-25] Beman Dawes wrote: For more background, including rationale, a FAQ, and acknowledgements, see http://boost.sourceforge.net/misc/license-background.html Nice. * Boosters for whom English isn't their primary language; is the license understandable? Spanish is my first, but English is a very close second. The impression I got is that it's somewhat hard to parse as it is. I had to read the second paragraph a few times before I managed to parse out the different parts of it. The main difficulty in the first part (the first two paragraphs) is the the lists in it are inconsistent and hard to see which are the items. For example, the switching from simple items to adding and in some of them threw me. I was expecting the list to end, but it did not. The second paragraph is long; and without any separators other than the commas it's hard to read. Here's an edited version which might be better for non-english readers to understand: Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person or organization obtaining a copy of the software covered by this license (the Software) to: use, reproduce, display, distribute, execute, transmit, prepare derivative works of the Software, and to permit third-parties to whom the Software is furnished to do so, all subject to the following: The copyright notice in the Software and this entire statement, including the above license grant, this restriction, and the following disclaimer, must be included, in whole or in part, in all copies of the Software, and all derivative works of the Software. Unless such copies or derivative works are solely in the form of machine-executable object code generated by a source language processor. ~~~[the dislaimer is fine] -- grafik - Don't Assume Anything -- rrivera (at) acm.org - grafik (at) redshift-software.com -- 102708583 (at) icq ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
Hi, Beman Dawes wrote: Thanks to Dave Abrahams, Diane Cabell, Devin Smith, and Eva Chen, we now have a pretty close to final draft of a new Boost Software License. The draft license itself is at http://boost.sourceforge.net/misc/LICENSE.txt Wow! While we are interested in comments from any Booster, we would particularly like to hear from: * Boosters for whom English isn't their primary language; is the license understandable? It looks ok for me. * Boosters (or their lawyers) from countries other than the US; do they spot any issues missed by Boost's US-centric legal team? * Boost developers; if there are aspects of the license that make you hesitate about adopting it, what are the issues? Well, I have a question. I understand that the text of this license is primarily intended to be used by Boost libraries and those that are candidates to be included in Boost. However, apart from the main Boost effort, some of the Boosters or just Boost lurkers may find the text of the license very good for their own work, which is not connected to the Boost itself. Long version: Let's imagine the following situation (it can apply to any developer on this planet): I write some code and want it to get public. It is outside of mainstream Boost interest, so I do not intend to submit it to Boost. Being concerned with the legal issues, I want to have a license text that is proven to be OK from the lawyers' viewpoint. Of course, a lot of people (Boosters and lawyers) have spent their time preparing and reviewing the Boost license and ensuring that it meets the high standards of today's open software. Is it OK if I just copy-n-paste the Boost license into my own work? Is it OK if I use only part of it? This can have many implications, including legal precedents - for example, when some of my users abuse the license or just asks me what he can do with the software, I can just point him to Boost pages, FAQs, etc. In other words, I may hide behind the curtains sewed by people who just never took me and my work into account. Is it OK if I do it? Short version: Is there any copyright on the Boost license text? What license protects the Boost license? :) -- Maciej Sobczak http://www.maciejsobczak.com/ ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
My preference is for there to be a single license file in the boost root directory, and each file covered include a link. So a source code file might contain something like: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation I'm not sure everyone agrees with that approach - part of the reason for discussion is to finalize that. I agree. Repetition in source code is, at best, annoying. Even if it is only in a license comment and not the code itself. Having the license in the file itself also ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
RE: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
My preference is for there to be a single license file in the boost root directory, and each file covered include a link. So a source code file might contain something like: // (C) Jane Programmer, 2003 // // See www.boost.org/license for license terms and conditions // // See www.boost.org/libs/janes-lib for documentation I'm not sure everyone agrees with that approach - part of the reason for discussion is to finalize that. I agree. Repetition in source code is, at best, annoying. Even if it is only in a license comment and not the code itself. Having the license in the file itself also... [sorry, sent too soon] ...makes the text subject to tools like find and replace which can alter copyright and is undetectable by the compilation process. Regards, Paul Mensonides ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
[2003-06-25] Rene Rivera wrote: must be included, in whole or in part, in all copies of the Software, and all derivative works of the Software. Oops, that should be: ...must me included in all... of the Software, in whole or in part. It just goes to show how hard it can be to understand this part ;-) -- grafik - Don't Assume Anything -- rrivera (at) acm.org - grafik (at) redshift-software.com -- 102708583 (at) icq ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
Re: [boost] Draft of new Boost Software License
At 03:43 PM 6/25/2003, Maciej Sobczak wrote: Well, I have a question. I understand that the text of this license is primarily intended to be used by Boost libraries and those that are candidates to be included in Boost. However, apart from the main Boost effort, some of the Boosters or just Boost lurkers may find the text of the license very good for their own work, which is not connected to the Boost itself. Long version: Let's imagine the following situation (it can apply to any developer on this planet): I write some code and want it to get public. It is outside of mainstream Boost interest, so I do not intend to submit it to Boost. Being concerned with the legal issues, I want to have a license text that is proven to be OK from the lawyers' viewpoint. Of course, a lot of people (Boosters and lawyers) have spent their time preparing and reviewing the Boost license and ensuring that it meets the high standards of today's open software. Is it OK if I just copy-n-paste the Boost license into my own work? Is it OK if I use only part of it? This can have many implications, including legal precedents - for example, when some of my users abuse the license or just asks me what he can do with the software, I can just point him to Boost pages, FAQs, etc. In other words, I may hide behind the curtains sewed by people who just never took me and my work into account. Is it OK if I do it? Short version: Is there any copyright on the Boost license text? What license protects the Boost license? :) I think part of the answer is that by submitting the Boost Software License to the OSI, if accepted, it will become available to anyone who wants to use it. But I'm passing some of the above on to the lawyers to get their take on the questions. Thanks, --Beman ___ Unsubscribe other changes: http://lists.boost.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/boost
