5 ms·

Sparrow is an iOS app. The App Store does not allow GPL'd applications. Also, it's conceivable that Google wants to incorporate Sparrow into their own iOS clie

• vijaykiran 14y ago
  > The App Store does not allow GPL'd applications. I don't think so, Wordpress for iOS is GPL licensed: http://ios.wordpress.org/development/ http://ios.wordpress.org/development/
  • radarsat1 14y ago
    I guess what is going on here is that WordPress owns the copyright to WordPress, and doesn't have any GPL dependencies, so they can do with it what they want. No one else is allowed to make a Wordpress app for iOS, however. (I didn't check and am not familiar with the WP source code.. if they do have any GPL dependencies they might be in violation. Likely their app just presents an interface to communicate with their server stuff, so things like databases or anything else the WordPress server depends on don't count as dependencies for the app--so as long as they wrote the app from scratch they are okay.)
    • bengtan 14y ago
      No they don't. If I remember correctly, Wordpress is a fork of an older GPL cms. They do not have the full copyrights to license it under a license of their own choosing.
      • pyre 14y ago
        You're answering the question with regards to "Wordpress the PHP app the CMS app that runs on a LAMP stack." I'm guessing that "Wordpress to iOS" is really just a native iOS mobile interface to the PHP CMS app. In that case, they probably have written it from scratch.
        • csixty4 14y ago
          No need to guess. Licensing info & source code are available at http://ios.wordpress.org/development/ http://ios.wordpress.org/development/ The Vendor directory contains the third-party libraries they're using. All of them appear to be MIT or Apache licensed.
• scraplab 14y ago
  No, the GPL doesn't allow App Store applications. I don't think Apple cares what you do with your source code.
  • fingerprinter 14y ago
    That can't possibly be right, can it? Do you have a source for that?
    • officemonkey 14y ago
      Folks who like the GPL may not like the Apple plantation, but NOTHING stops anyone from releasing their code under the GPL. You don't need permission from EFF, GNU.org, or Stallman himself to release your source under the GPL.
    • autodidakto 14y ago
      Look up the VLC on iOS story. Apple approved it, then the developer of VLC (who gave permission to the iOS developers, Applidium i think) decided to come out of nowhere and challenge the app. They argued that GPL was incompatible with the app store rules and therefore apple should change their rules or get rid of GPL apps. I think it's the DRM they wrap around the binary that makes it incompatible. Apple said yawn and removed the app. Their reasoning was that the original copyright holder, the VLC head French guy, was disputting it. But, my guess is iff you submit GPL'ed code and no one complains, apple could care less (how would they even know?). And if you are the copyright holder, you can of course release it under GPL and submit it to apple. It's hard to say what the VLC guy's motivations were or if he cared that Applidium was screwed over.
    • Dylan16807 14y ago
      The GPL has a small deficiency that each entity in the distribution chain has to provide source code. If it allowed that responsibility to pass through apple to the developer there wouldn't be an issue. Since apple isn't interested in performing that service, no GPL code in the app store.
• bsg75 14y ago
  It is a Mac desktop app as well.