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I develop GPL software too. Quite a lot of it, actually. I'm not sure what you mean by "route around GPL". I chose BSD because it will maximise usability in ce

by wbhart 13y ago

I develop GPL software too. Quite a lot of it, actually. I'm not sure what you mean by "route around GPL". I chose BSD because it will maximise usability in certain BSD licensed programming languages. You can always fork the code, put the GPL on it and distribute it under those terms if you want.

protomyth 13y ago
> You can always fork the code, put the GPL on it and distribute it under those terms if you want. They can GPL their changes, but your original copyright and license stands[1]. If it was any other way, the GPL would be no protection. 1) unless you go public domain or grant the ability to change the license which the BSD does not.
- wbhart 13y ago
  There is a difference between the license under which a project is distributed and the license of individual contributions. Any GPL project can use BSD contributions. The overall license of the project remains GPL. The opposite is not true. A BSD licensed project cannot incorporate GPL code, otherwise the project becomes a GPL project, not a BSD one.
  - protomyth 13y ago
    A mixed project's source files are BSD & GPL, it has to obey both. The BSD requirements[1] have to be honored as well as the GPL and any other licensed used. 1) such as "Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution."
  - belorn 13y ago
    By defining it as BSD project or and GPL project, one basically make two stand points. 1: The license choice is a political one. Picking the BSD license (or GPL) is equal to doing a political message. 2: The key feature of the project is defined by the circumstances that permission is granted to use, copy, and distribute.
crististm 13y ago
You can't fork a BSD project and relicense it as GPL unless you are the copyright owner. "Route around GPL" is the tendency to avoid GPL license on new projects (or to change the license on existing projects - see VLC and jquery). Since project owners are free to do that anyway, the question is why is the BSD license trumpeted as a feature of the product? Let's take the example of LLVM: there is no problem using GCC on MACs since GCC itself can be used to build proprietary systems. However, LLVM is promoted as "this is your dream compiler - fast, feature full and free from GPL restrictions".
- wbhart 13y ago
  I don't understand the comment about forking. Sure, you can't take my files and change the license on them. But you can take any and all of my files as is, incorporate them into your own GPL project. That's effective the same thing as now the project itself must be distributed under the terms of the GPL. So long as you don't violate the terms of the BSD license, you are free to do what you want. Going the other way is not possible. (Of course when I say BSD license I mean modified-BSD, not the original 4-term license. We don't use that of course.)

by wbhart 13y ago

protomyth 13y ago

> You can always fork the code, put the GPL on it and distribute it under those terms if you want. They can GPL their changes, but your original copyright and license stands[1]. If it was any other way, the GPL would be no protection. 1) unless you go public domain or grant the ability to change the license which the BSD does not.

wbhart 13y ago
There is a difference between the license under which a project is distributed and the license of individual contributions. Any GPL project can use BSD contributions. The overall license of the project remains GPL. The opposite is not true. A BSD licensed project cannot incorporate GPL code, otherwise the project becomes a GPL project, not a BSD one.
- protomyth 13y ago
  A mixed project's source files are BSD & GPL, it has to obey both. The BSD requirements[1] have to be honored as well as the GPL and any other licensed used. 1) such as "Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution."
- belorn 13y ago
  By defining it as BSD project or and GPL project, one basically make two stand points. 1: The license choice is a political one. Picking the BSD license (or GPL) is equal to doing a political message. 2: The key feature of the project is defined by the circumstances that permission is granted to use, copy, and distribute.

crististm 13y ago

You can't fork a BSD project and relicense it as GPL unless you are the copyright owner. "Route around GPL" is the tendency to avoid GPL license on new projects (or to change the license on existing projects - see VLC and jquery). Since project owners are free to do that anyway, the question is why is the BSD license trumpeted as a feature of the product? Let's take the example of LLVM: there is no problem using GCC on MACs since GCC itself can be used to build proprietary systems. However, LLVM is promoted as "this is your dream compiler - fast, feature full and free from GPL restrictions".

wbhart 13y ago
I don't understand the comment about forking. Sure, you can't take my files and change the license on them. But you can take any and all of my files as is, incorporate them into your own GPL project. That's effective the same thing as now the project itself must be distributed under the terms of the GPL. So long as you don't violate the terms of the BSD license, you are free to do what you want. Going the other way is not possible. (Of course when I say BSD license I mean modified-BSD, not the original 4-term license. We don't use that of course.)