On Feb 12, 11:58 am, Daniel Baird <[email protected]> wrote: > Licencing: > BSD? GPL? Maybe LGPL? I have a vague sense of the difference > between these, but I have no idea what the real ramifications are of > each. Will GPL get in the way of corporate use, even just > psychologically? And I'd like to allow some kind of plugin > arrangement that permits non-open source addons. Any advice?
F/OSS licences are a bit like religion I'm afraid, however... Roughly speaking you have permissive licences at one end of the spectrum and strong copyleft licences at the other, with both capable of inspiring love or hate depending on where you sit. Permissive licenses such as the BSD are about the freedom of the implementer to do as they please, whether that be to just use the software or to make a proprietary derivative version to sell for profit. Whereas the GPL series are about ensuring the freedom of the software in perpetuity. If someone modifies GPL-licensed software and sells binaries for profit, they must also make an offer to provide the corresponding source code to those in receipt of said binaries. This positive obligation only comes into effect with redistribution, and does not come into effect with own use. So if a company used a modified version of your software internally, they would not have to give anyone copies of the changes they made. Although there is a variant of the GPL called the AGPL, that regards service provision as redistribution, and this aims to safeguard the intent of developers producing 'free' (free as in freedom,e.g. GPL-licensed) software, in a world that has moved from sales of the software artefact itself, to a SaaS model. Permissive licenses tend to carry some obligations, but typically just to attribute the code to its original author(s) (e.g. in licence notices contained in derived source, a boot message or 'Help -> About' menu etc) and such. Note that if you own copyright to all the code you can dual-license also, e.g. GPL + commercial. With this example you could sell someone a commercial licence if their use is incompatible with the GPL, e.g. they want to modify your code and distribute it to a 3rd party, but are unwilling/unable to provide source, or alternatively they want to combine it with software furnished via a licence that is incompatible with the GPL. With those who are happy with the GPL using the software at no cost, under its terms. The GPL as-is does not preclude business use, rather instead I would say it encourages companies to build value on top of providing a good service, instead of relying on revenue from simply software sales. There are a lot of common misconceptions surrounding the GPL, which can admittedly hinder adoption at some organisations. You'd be advised to do a bit more digging yourself, but I would suggest that if your goal is to just get the software out there, then to use a permissive license such as the BSD. Whereas if you want to ensure the continued freedom of the software, and to be say guaranteed access to the source corresponding to a commercial 3rd party derivative, then GPL might be a better option. Another consideration is the community's preference. If the TiddlyWiki community has a history of using the BSD, then this might influence your decision... Then again, it might not (nor warrant doing). Hth (and hasn't served to further muddy waters). Cheers, Andrew --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TiddlyWiki" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/TiddlyWiki?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
