<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Soeren</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">It is very unlikely that IBM will change
CPL. There is no strong pressure to do so internally, and from the
point of view of usability, there are no strong reasons either.</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">After reading through the debian-legal
email thread, I do sympathize with your concerns! This could
be a lot of risk for one person to take on in terms of investment of time.
On the bright side, it does seem like packages with CPL have made
it into Debian, despite all the arguing (although maybe they squeaked in
while folks were arguing about other things :-).</font>
<br>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif">Perhaps the best way to go is to diffuse
the risk by taking it to Coin-TLC and asking if Coin wants to do this.
Perhaps there are enough Project Managers willing to share in the work
of preparing a Debian submission.</font>
<br><font size=2 face="sans-serif"><br>
Alan </font>
<br>
<br>
<br>
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<td width=40%><font size=1 face="sans-serif"><b>Soeren Sonnenburg <Soeren.Sonnenburg@first.fraunhofer.de></b>
</font>
<br><font size=1 face="sans-serif">Sent by: coin-discuss-bounces@list.coin-or.org</font>
<p><font size=1 face="sans-serif">04/07/2008 04:36 AM</font>
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<div align=right><font size=1 face="sans-serif">To</font></div>
<td><font size=1 face="sans-serif">Brady Hunsaker <bkh@member.fsf.org></font>
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<div align=right><font size=1 face="sans-serif">cc</font></div>
<td><font size=1 face="sans-serif">coin-discuss@list.coin-or.org</font>
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<td>
<div align=right><font size=1 face="sans-serif">Subject</font></div>
<td><font size=1 face="sans-serif">Re: [Coin-discuss] COIN-OR licences
again...</font></table>
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<br>
<br><tt><font size=2>On Sun, 2008-04-06 at 23:11 -0400, Brady Hunsaker
wrote:<br>
> Soeren,<br>
<br>
Hi Brady,<br>
<br>
> I use Debian desktops at home and Ubuntu laptops (which is <br>
> Debian-based), so I'm sympathetic with the desire to be DFSG-free.
I <br>
> actually didn't know that this issue existed until your email.<br>
> <br>
> I'm also sympathetic with your desire for license compatibility, and
I <br>
> prefer to release code that I write under both the CPL and GPL. <br>
> However, I don't think it's likely that the core components of COIN-OR
<br>
> will be relicensed. Contributors to COIN-OR retain their copyrights.
<br>
> Many COIN-OR projects, including CLP, have IBM as one copyright holder
<br>
> (in many cases IBM is the primary or only copyright holder). As
I <br>
> expect you know, IBM wrote the CPL. I'm sure that people at
IBM thought <br>
> about issues of GPL-compatibility at the time, so I'm pretty sure
that <br>
> IBM isn't going to change its mind based on that argument. As
long as <br>
> IBM doesn't change its mind, the license for many COIN-OR projects
won't <br>
> change.<br>
<br>
It is clear that to be useful IBM would have to dual license the core<br>
of COIN-OR. However as a start projects could switch to dual licenses.<br>
While legally there is no way to release the full project under the GPL<br>
license while using CPL'd code it is still possible to supply only the<br>
addon parts under GPL too. However, to be useful either someone needs to<br>
rewrite the CPL'd parts or IBM dual licenses ... as I don't see why IBM<br>
would not want to see COIN-OR to become the defacto widespread standard<br>
I think there is a lot of hope to see coin-or dual licensed *if* someone<br>
at ibm is willing to go through the trouble of doing the paper-work.<br>
<br>
> As for the Debian issues, I wasn't previously aware that there was
any <br>
> doubt about the CPL being DFSG-free. As Matt pointed out, the
CPL is <br>
> OSI-approved and considered a free software license by the FSF. The
<br>
> only discussions I find about the CPL on Debian lists are these:<br>
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2001/12/msg00141.html<br>
> in which the only responser indicates that the CPL probably is DFSG-free<br>
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/1999/06/msg00216.html<br>
> which suggests that the IBM Public License is probably DFSG-free,
and<br>
> http://www.mail-archive.com/debian-java@lists.debian.org/msg10468.html<br>
> <br>
> I don't know of a good way to search all the debian packages based
on <br>
> license, but the following provide evidence that the CPL is DFSG-free:<br>
<br>
I also asked on debian-legal <br>
http://www.mail-archive.com/debian-legal@lists.debian.org/msg37367.html<br>
<br>
the answer is yes though there is no official statement.<br>
<br>
> graphviz: under the CPL and in Debian main<br>
> postfix: under the IBM Public License (identical to CPL except name)
and <br>
> in Debian main<br>
> eclipse: under the Eclipse Public License (almost the same as the
CPL) <br>
> and in Debian main<br>
<br>
I think this is enough evidence... <br>
<br>
> Postfix has been around a long time, so it's probably the best evidence
<br>
> that the CPL is DFSG-free, even though the wiki doesn't explicitly
say <br>
> so. Of course, none of that changes the GPL incompatibility,
which I <br>
> also find frustrating.<br>
<br>
Indeed, if I cannot easily use coin-or in my own software projects (>
1<br>
contributor so adding an exception is troublesome too) what would be my<br>
motivation to invest my spare time to get coin-or into debian...<br>
<br>
Soeren<br>
-- <br>
Soeren Sonnenburg - Fraunhofer FIRST Tel: +49 (30)
6392 1882<br>
Kekulestr. 7, 12489 Berlin, Germany Fax: +49 (30)
6392 1805<br>
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<br>