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total bs of a FUD article > it’s unclear what other code may be exposed to the virality of the license. The fear is that a company could be forced into open-so

total bs of a FUD article > it’s unclear what other code may be exposed to the virality of the license. The fear is that a company could be forced into open-sourcing software that was not intended to be open source. wikipedia says agpl was brought in 2002. so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? >if you modify the Program, your modified version must prominently offer all users interacting with it remotely through a computer network this is the most important part of the license that everyone just gleans over. There is no SSPL-like virality in AGPL. you can use unmodified AGPL code alongside proprietary code, all you have to do is put the license file up there. IF you modify the code, that modification NEEDS to be shared to customers on demand. That's it. this means if i use AGPL software in a SAAS environment and i modify 1 character line from a file, all i have to do to comply with the license is to make that DIFF or modification available to customer saying "i used AGPL software ABC, here is the modified version". that's all there is to it. edit: > It’s founded on the ethical principle that all software should be free. Free as in freedom. If you get a readymade code for a software, all this license enforce is that you can't use it to fork it into a proprietary software and not giving your downstream users the same rights you were given. >Many corporations will forbid end-users from installing any AGPL-licensed code on corporate devices out of an abundance of caution. this may be a reality but doesnt make it any less bullshit. i recently read an auditor might flag using open source software, like what? Please prove me wrong about AGPL

tpmoney 3y ago
> wikipedia says agpl was brought in 2002. so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? Not commenting on the rest of the article but “usage” does not equal “understanding”. Plenty of people use computers without an understanding of what they’re doing or capable of. Plenty of people use AI models today without understanding what they’re actually doing. Heck a huge chunk of modern medicine is stuff we have no understanding of how it actually works, we just know that it does and have a small amount of empirical evidence to give use some fuzzy boundaries.
ridiculous_fish 3y ago
This does not match my understanding. The AGPL does not include any linking exception, so if I include a 500 line JSON parser in my 5 million line app, and that JSON parser is AGPL licensed, then all 5 million lines are considered to be "based on" the JSON parser, and all 5 million lines must be made available under the AGPL. This is true even if I don't modify a single character of the parser. Am I wrong?
- bluGill 3y ago
  Right, LPGL and AGPL are very different things and OP seems to have them confused. AGPL and GPL do have a linking exception, but only for those two licenses and nothing else. (at least not as I read it - I'm not a lawyer)
  - pritambaral 3y ago
    Plus, a copyright owner can supply additional linking exceptions.
    - bluGill 3y ago
      Then it isn't a pure license and lawyers have to look even harder to ensure all is correct.
      - pritambaral 3y ago
        Idk, Java's Classpath Exception seems pretty "pure" for a license. Also pretty simple.
  - 2Gkashmiri 3y ago
    where is virality of agpl and gpl written?
- pmontra 3y ago
  You're probably right, there is no LAGPL https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#AGPL https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#AGPL One could add that as an extra clause. It's not easy but one should always recursively check the licenses of every dependency. If one doesn't, one can't even enforce a ban on AGPL software because it might slip into a project deep inside the node_modules directory or the equivalent in that code base. A simple implementation could be looking for LICENSE files or files containing some keyword. If the file matches the standard licenses you know what they are. If they don't, they could be custom licenses and should be checked.
kube-system 3y ago
>> The fear is that a company could be forced into open-sourcing software that was not intended to be open source. > wikipedia says agpl was brought in 2002. so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? The fear referenced here isn't about what the license does. The fear are the unknowns about how it will affect business operations in the future after building a business around a piece of code with that licensing obligation attached to it. > you can use unmodified AGPL code alongside proprietary code, all you have to do is put the license file up there. You cannot. AGPL only has one linking exception, and it is for code licensed with GPL.
bluGill 3y ago
Lawyers are clear what AGPL means, and they are not confident they can limit the other code that someone would accidentally combine with AGPL if it was used at all so they ban AGPL. While it is possible to monitor and control what code is combined, they are not sure they would do that correctly as a large company with thousands of engineers any one of which might make a mistake. What companies want is if someone does violate a licesne they can argue it was a rouge employee and so ask the court to just apply a small monetary damage fine as opposed to something large [like opening up all code a AGPL demands]. However in order to argue this in court they need to show the court they made a good faith effort to ensure violations didn't happen in the first place. Those are good enough that most companies won't violate the license in the first place.
- 2Gkashmiri 3y ago
  AGPL demands opening up AGPL code if you modify it, otherwise just say you used this particular agpl code, where does it say you have to open up your entire codebase?
phonon 3y ago
Many users of AGPL contend that if you connect to their AGPL code by API, your entire application needs to share its entire source code (including to anyone who accesses it over a network/internet.) For example, the founder of iText feels very strongly about this. As you can imagine, that makes iText almost impossible to use in a commercial setting, if you want their AGPL version. You need to buy their commercially licensed version. "If user A pushes a button in product X, and by doing a technical effect is triggered that results in an action in (A)GPL library Y, then product X needs to be released under the same license as library Y to user A no matter how product X is technically implemented!" https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/chapters/c13.html https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/chapters/c13.html https://itextpdf.com/how-buy/AGPLv3-license https://itextpdf.com/how-buy/AGPLv3-license https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/ossurvival/index.html https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/ossurvival/index.html https://www.slideshare.net/iTextPDF/ianal-what-developers-should-know-about-ip-and-legal https://www.slideshare.net/iTextPDF/ianal-what-developers-sh... https://opensource.stackexchange.com/a/6904 https://opensource.stackexchange.com/a/6904
wmf 3y ago
so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? Such a situation can persist indefinitely if nobody wants to go to court.

tpmoney 3y ago

> wikipedia says agpl was brought in 2002. so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? Not commenting on the rest of the article but “usage” does not equal “understanding”. Plenty of people use computers without an understanding of what they’re doing or capable of. Plenty of people use AI models today without understanding what they’re actually doing. Heck a huge chunk of modern medicine is stuff we have no understanding of how it actually works, we just know that it does and have a small amount of empirical evidence to give use some fuzzy boundaries.

ridiculous_fish 3y ago

This does not match my understanding. The AGPL does not include any linking exception, so if I include a 500 line JSON parser in my 5 million line app, and that JSON parser is AGPL licensed, then all 5 million lines are considered to be "based on" the JSON parser, and all 5 million lines must be made available under the AGPL. This is true even if I don't modify a single character of the parser. Am I wrong?

bluGill 3y ago
Right, LPGL and AGPL are very different things and OP seems to have them confused. AGPL and GPL do have a linking exception, but only for those two licenses and nothing else. (at least not as I read it - I'm not a lawyer)
- pritambaral 3y ago
  Plus, a copyright owner can supply additional linking exceptions.
  - bluGill 3y ago
    Then it isn't a pure license and lawyers have to look even harder to ensure all is correct.
    - pritambaral 3y ago
      Idk, Java's Classpath Exception seems pretty "pure" for a license. Also pretty simple.
- 2Gkashmiri 3y ago
  where is virality of agpl and gpl written?
pmontra 3y ago
You're probably right, there is no LAGPL https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#AGPL https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#AGPL One could add that as an extra clause. It's not easy but one should always recursively check the licenses of every dependency. If one doesn't, one can't even enforce a ban on AGPL software because it might slip into a project deep inside the node_modules directory or the equivalent in that code base. A simple implementation could be looking for LICENSE files or files containing some keyword. If the file matches the standard licenses you know what they are. If they don't, they could be custom licenses and should be checked.

kube-system 3y ago

>> The fear is that a company could be forced into open-sourcing software that was not intended to be open source. > wikipedia says agpl was brought in 2002. so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? The fear referenced here isn't about what the license does. The fear are the unknowns about how it will affect business operations in the future after building a business around a piece of code with that licensing obligation attached to it. > you can use unmodified AGPL code alongside proprietary code, all you have to do is put the license file up there. You cannot. AGPL only has one linking exception, and it is for code licensed with GPL.

bluGill 3y ago

Lawyers are clear what AGPL means, and they are not confident they can limit the other code that someone would accidentally combine with AGPL if it was used at all so they ban AGPL. While it is possible to monitor and control what code is combined, they are not sure they would do that correctly as a large company with thousands of engineers any one of which might make a mistake. What companies want is if someone does violate a licesne they can argue it was a rouge employee and so ask the court to just apply a small monetary damage fine as opposed to something large [like opening up all code a AGPL demands]. However in order to argue this in court they need to show the court they made a good faith effort to ensure violations didn't happen in the first place. Those are good enough that most companies won't violate the license in the first place.

2Gkashmiri 3y ago
AGPL demands opening up AGPL code if you modify it, otherwise just say you used this particular agpl code, where does it say you have to open up your entire codebase?

phonon 3y ago

Many users of AGPL contend that if you connect to their AGPL code by API, your entire application needs to share its entire source code (including to anyone who accesses it over a network/internet.) For example, the founder of iText feels very strongly about this. As you can imagine, that makes iText almost impossible to use in a commercial setting, if you want their AGPL version. You need to buy their commercially licensed version. "If user A pushes a button in product X, and by doing a technical effect is triggered that results in an action in (A)GPL library Y, then product X needs to be released under the same license as library Y to user A no matter how product X is technically implemented!" https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/chapters/c13.html https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/chapters/c13.html https://itextpdf.com/how-buy/AGPLv3-license https://itextpdf.com/how-buy/AGPLv3-license https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/ossurvival/index.html https://entreprenerd.lowagie.com/ossurvival/index.html https://www.slideshare.net/iTextPDF/ianal-what-developers-should-know-about-ip-and-legal https://www.slideshare.net/iTextPDF/ianal-what-developers-sh... https://opensource.stackexchange.com/a/6904 https://opensource.stackexchange.com/a/6904

wmf 3y ago

so around 21 years of people using this license and no one knows clearly what it does? Such a situation can persist indefinitely if nobody wants to go to court.