Slashdot Mirror

In the US, at least, labeling food as organic requires that it meets the US's organic certification requirements. Wikipedia suggests that other countries have similar laws. I am not well-versed in the issue, so perhaps you disagree with the requirements for marking food as "organic".

On the other hand, the term "open source" is not legally regulated and not trademarked. However, it is commonly understood to refer to software covered by a license meeting The Open Source Definition.

By their very nature many products cannot be ported without their foundations being ported as well. Do any forbid different platforms, though? Perhaps not. But show me one clause in the official definition (according to RMS) at http://opensource.org/docs/osd that says open source can be tied to a specific platform?

I will assume you mean "can't" instead of "can", for otherwise your post is meaningless.

Points 3 and 10 are clearly against a restriction to a platform.

It talks of products, but that's only that open source can be extract from part of a product an true open source can't forbid it. Last time I checked, CodePlex projects are part of Windows itself.

Huh?

Isn't this pretty much why RMS argues against using the phrase "open source"?

IIRC, his point was basically that "free software" allows you to study, modify, and use the software. Open source, on the other hand, means just that; the source is there for you to look at, but different licenses have different restrictions on the use and modification of the code.

In RMS's own words: http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point.html

OSI's definition of Open Source: http://opensource.org/docs/osd

By their very nature many products cannot be ported without their foundations being ported as well. Do any forbid different platforms, though? Perhaps not. But show me one clause in the official definition (according to RMS) at http://opensource.org/docs/osd that says open source can be tied to a specific platform? It talks of products, but that's only that open source can be extract from part of a product an true open source can't forbid it. Last time I checked, CodePlex projects are part of Windows itself.

See points 8 and 10 of the open source software definition http://www.opensource.org/docs/osd

This is one end of the spectrum of definition of "open source".

The more commonly understood definition is a license that meets the Open Source Definition, which MS-LPL obviously does not (contravenes point 10 at least).

It would not be outlandish to suggest that MS are trying to dilute the expectations of those hearing the words "open source" to include their more, well, useless definitions like MS-RSL which allows you to refer to the source for the purpose of increasing your understanding of the library (so you can make your stuff work around their "quirks", presumably), but doesn't actually grant you the right to build it, fix it, distribute it, or even use the binaries.

Open source does not mean open platform, case closed.

WRONG. Open source does mean the right to modify code to work on your platform of choice.

See the Open Source Definition. The definitive explanation of what open source software is that the public knows of and takes for granted (currently).

From http://www.opensource.org

Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code. The distribution terms of open-source software must comply with the following criteria: [...]

Emphasis mine.

It used to be registered as a service mark of the Open Source Initiative.

However, I believe the trademark registration was allowed to lapse in 1999. It is a shame, because this is the type of confusion that the trademark and trademark law should have prevented.

No, "open source" means no license restrictions on what you do with the code. If the license forbids you to run the code on another OS, or another pieces of hardware, it is not open. Neither is it open if you prevent the use of the code for a particular purpose. If you want to use the code to tabulate a list of people who you intend to round up, incarcerate, and incinerate, people will deplore your morals, but the OSS movement in principle defend your right to use open source code to do it (but does not allow you to create a license that says that same group of people cannot use your software).

Read point 10 of the Open Source Definition

Please mod the parent down. Open Source must conform to the Open Source Definition, which lists ten points. Free Software must respect the Four Freedoms that the FSF enumerated. These are roughly equivalent. The FSF prefers the GPL, but they accept other licenses are Free Software.

Hopefully you won't be modded Troll. But "Open Source" is a little more than being able to see the source code.
Have a peer at the definition.

OSI?

Thanks for the mp3 link.

The big part of the debate is what the specific license is: conditions based on copyright or a contract agreement between two parties.

The license in question is the Artistic License 1.0, which the justices pointed out has this in the preamble:

The intent of this document is to state the conditions under which a Package may be copied

Question answered.But Artistic License 2.0 lacks this language, as do other OSI licenses. Does this mean that we will hear this same "this is only a contract" argument again for other license?

This is a big deal: contracts allow only specific monetary damages (which often doesn't exist for gratis software)--this is one of the so-called "loophole" arguments against open source. Copyright violations can be seen as leading to irreparable harm. This leads to larger penalties, injunctions, etc.

Thanks for the mp3 link.

The big part of the debate is what the specific license is: conditions based on copyright or a contract agreement between two parties.

The license in question is the Artistic License 1.0, which the justices pointed out has this in the preamble:

The intent of this document is to state the conditions under which a Package may be copied

Question answered.But Artistic License 2.0 lacks this language, as do other OSI licenses. Does this mean that we will hear this same "this is only a contract" argument again for other license?

This is a big deal: contracts allow only specific monetary damages (which often doesn't exist for gratis software)--this is one of the so-called "loophole" arguments against open source. Copyright violations can be seen as leading to irreparable harm. This leads to larger penalties, injunctions, etc.

Zlib license

http://opensource.org/licenses/zlib-license.php

Just take out the:

"""
an acknowledgment in the product documentation would be
appreciated but is not required.
"""

And replace it with:

"""
an acknowledgment in the product documentation is required.
"""

Or some other wording that you like better.

You could do similar things with licenses such as the MIT or BSD. But, for the love of god, do NOT use the [L]GPL. If you respect the academic freedom of others, you'll stay *very* far away from that license.

Licenses can and should restrict use of source code.

Results are obtained by using the software, not by using the source code. A source code license cannot restrict use of the compiled software, because it is out of the scope of copyright law.

There is no law against using source code you were able to download and doing what you like with the results. You don't have to accept a software license of any kind to be able to do what you want with the results.

Your end user has to accept and follow a software license to modify and distribute a copyright work, or to perform other acts restricted by copyright law.

The data in a table of results is not a copyright work; they're just the facts of that run of a computer program.

To legally restrict use of results: you require instead a EULA or a contract. Which also makes the software not considered 'Open'

It is better to use a license that requires maintaining copyright disclaimers for distributions of the source code, for example, GPLv2 (since GPLv3 is considered bad).

Or say the Open Software License

Or if you wish to not require source code distribution in derivative works: MIT License, Academic Free License, or a Creative Commons Attribution license.

Licenses can and should restrict use of source code.

Results are obtained by using the software, not by using the source code. A source code license cannot restrict use of the compiled software, because it is out of the scope of copyright law.

There is no law against using source code you were able to download and doing what you like with the results. You don't have to accept a software license of any kind to be able to do what you want with the results.

Your end user has to accept and follow a software license to modify and distribute a copyright work, or to perform other acts restricted by copyright law.

The data in a table of results is not a copyright work; they're just the facts of that run of a computer program.

To legally restrict use of results: you require instead a EULA or a contract. Which also makes the software not considered 'Open'

It is better to use a license that requires maintaining copyright disclaimers for distributions of the source code, for example, GPLv2 (since GPLv3 is considered bad).

Or say the Open Software License

Or if you wish to not require source code distribution in derivative works: MIT License, Academic Free License, or a Creative Commons Attribution license.

Licenses can and should restrict use of source code.

Results are obtained by using the software, not by using the source code. A source code license cannot restrict use of the compiled software, because it is out of the scope of copyright law.

There is no law against using source code you were able to download and doing what you like with the results. You don't have to accept a software license of any kind to be able to do what you want with the results.

Your end user has to accept and follow a software license to modify and distribute a copyright work, or to perform other acts restricted by copyright law.

The data in a table of results is not a copyright work; they're just the facts of that run of a computer program.

To legally restrict use of results: you require instead a EULA or a contract. Which also makes the software not considered 'Open'

It is better to use a license that requires maintaining copyright disclaimers for distributions of the source code, for example, GPLv2 (since GPLv3 is considered bad).

Or say the Open Software License

Or if you wish to not require source code distribution in derivative works: MIT License, Academic Free License, or a Creative Commons Attribution license.

I would think that most \.ers would be cheering this since its akin to open source

I'm cheering it, but it's not akin to open source. The open source definition explicitly states several conditions that must be satisfied for something to be called "open source". In this case, the license forbids commercial use of the material, so it's not open source.

What if someone takes your code and patents a part of it? BSD then says you cannot claim the patent or protect yourself from it.

This is incorrect. The word "patent" or derivatives do not appear in the BSD license. You can read it here

And patent law says you can't use your BSD code.

Patent law says you must license legally patented methods to include them in a product. It does not interact with the concept of software licensing.

It therefore doesn't matter if you feel confident in obeying the BSD. Your feelings will not make a hill of beans difference. And you will be disallowed.

?.

Stripping away the FUD here makes this a lot simpler. I make widgets, and tell the world how to make widgets. Company X patents my widget making process. Company X's patent is invalid because of my prior art.

Patent law is too complicated as it is. Don't make it worse with FUD.

So what? These licenses don't grant patent protection.

Citation needed. From the Ms-PL:

Patent Grant- Subject to the terms of this license, including the license conditions and limitations in section 3, each contributor grants you a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free license under its licensed patents to make, have made, use, sell, offer for sale, import, and/or otherwise dispose of its contribution in the software or derivative works of the contribution in the software.

I think the Microsoft Public License or the Microsoft Reciprocal License might be more likely.

I think the Microsoft Public License or the Microsoft Reciprocal License might be more likely.

http://www.opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical

Are there any licences that provide the same kind of stuff without linking me to them, or should I just change the name of the GPL when I licence my software?

Certainly. Have a browse through http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category. I suggest using the Microsoft Reciprocal License (basically equivalent to the LGPL, and perfectly GPL-compatible), just to piss off the FSF...

Are there any licences that provide the same kind of stuff without linking me to them, or should I just change the name of the GPL when I licence my software?

Certainly. Have a browse through http://www.opensource.org/licenses/category. I suggest using the Microsoft Reciprocal License (basically equivalent to the LGPL, and perfectly GPL-compatible), just to piss off the FSF...

FUD and lies. The Apache license requires you share the code that is under the Apache license.

No it doesn't. It says 'Source or Object form'.

>> The iPod Touch is also a serious contender.
> No, it's a serious oxymoron - "Apple" and "Open Source".

*Ahem* http://www.opensource.org/licenses/apsl-2.0.php

Maybe because it's freaking NASA?

What's that have anything to do with it?

NASA has an OSI approved license:

• NASA Open Source License

It could probably be easier to find NASA software, and I doubt this particular software would ever be released, but there's lots of NASA software that's been released:

• from Ames
• from Goddard
• from NAS
• ... and whatever stuff's out in the wild that's not being tracked.

There's issues because much of NASA stuff is done as part of grants, and so it's officially owned by the academic / research institution that won the grant ... as such, there might be other NASA funded code that's out there, that you don't know is NASA code... at least one program (AISRP) has started a place to collect software by grantees.

I've been to NASA workshops where there's plenty of code that's being written where people would LOVE to have their software find a broader audience. At the last one, we had an hour debate on if we were allowed to release code as GPL, as that'd place restrictions on the use of the code (that derivative copies have to be open), which should not be done as the software was developed w/ federal money and as such citizens should be free to do whatever they want with it. I think someone was assigned to talk to NASA's legal department and find out what we had to do to release our code.

While there is a large overlap between the approved Free Software Licenses and the approved Open Source Licenses, the fact that a project has a license that is in both lists doesn't make it both Open Source and Free Software.

Sorry, but that's insane. You may dislike the other term ('Free Software' if you call your work 'Open Source' and 'Open Source' if you define your work as 'Free Software'), but the Linux kernel is both Free Software and Open Source, Python is both Open Source and Free Software, and so is all of the software in Debian main.

Consider the GPL - it's approved by both. But Red Hat doesn't publish Free Software, it publishes Open Source

According to your theory, the Linux kernel is partly Open Source and partly free, because some of the developers adscribe to the Free Software philosophy, while others are paid by Open Source companies. Does that make Linux 89% (or whatever) Open Source and only 11% free?

I too prefer to call it "Free Software" (I am Spanish, so "software libre" rolls of my tongue better than "open source"), but we can't pretend that Open Source and Free Software are exclusive terms.

The academic community studying Free and Open Source Software call it that, or by its acronym FOSS/FLOSS (the L standing for "Libre"). That way they can do away with the terminological hairsplitting and devote their attention to whatever aspect of Free Software they want to study.

Consider the GPL - it's approved by both. But Red Hat doesn't publish Free Software, it publishes Open Source - and software written by Richard Stallman isn't Open Source - it's Free Software, and RMS is happy to explain the difference.

I'm squarely in Stallman's camp; my audio project Ogg Frog is definitely Free Software, not Open Source.

You see, the distinction isn't the license - it's the purpose behind making the project either Open or Free.

As Stallman explains, Open Source is about efficiency - volunteer coders, and "many eyeballs" finding and correcting bugs and security holes. Free Software is about creating a community - Stallman has made it very clear he hopes to get back to the way things were back in the day, when source was shared openly with no non-disclosure agreements, copyrights or licenses.

Unfortunately, the English language has a problem: Free can mean "as in Freedom", or "without cost". When I speak of my Free Software project to non-techie people, they think I'm just not going to charge money for it, and question my sanity. They have no clue about the meaning behind Free Software.

Spanish doesn't have that problem: Free as in Freedom is "Libre", free as in beer is "gratis". But those words don't make sense to English speakers.

I have developed a convention, but it's too subtle for most to take notice. Perhaps they will if you join me: I capitalize the "F" if it's "Free as in Freedom", but use lowercase for "free as in beer". I think that emphasizes the difference, and maybe if we all wrote it that way, more people would understand.

Stallman is a great man, IMHO, but he has a marketing and image problem: very few non-technical people have the first clue as to what Free Software means. Most think it means "freeware".

But Open Source doesn't have that problem; many who don't know source code from Shinola do understand what Open Source is all about.

Thus I long ago gave up trying to describe Ogg Frog as Free Software in casual conversation. I only say that when speaking to others who will likely understand. Most of the time I describe it as Open Source, but feel guilty in doing so. I feel like Matthew in these verses:

Peter said unto him, Lord, why cannot I follow thee now? I will lay down my life for thy sake. Jesus answered him, Wilt thou lay down thy life for my sake? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, The cock shall not crow, till thou hast denied me thrice. -- John 13, 37-38

(BTW - there's no Ogg Frog to download yet, not even CVS or Subversion. Out of consideration for my non-technical target market, I'm not releasing anything until it reaches it's planned 1.0 feature set, and is reasonably bug free. At least for non-technical users, I feel The Cathedral is better than The Bazaar.

That question is answered in the link, at least as far as the most common OSI approved licences, GPL, LGPL, MPL...

Neither GNU nor Linux is mentioned in OSI's definition of Open Source.

You may be correct here, but don't be surprised if it does eventually break apart, businesses (especially U.S. based businesses) are accustomed to dealing with extremely complex laws and if GPL gets in the way of the likes of Microsoft/GM/ADM... look out! Many companies have higher revenue than the GNPs of all but the G8 and they don't even like abiding by U.S. tax law, much less Kyoto, WTC etc. GPL is hardly a bit of road-kill, much less an obstacle to the wishes of these mega corprations.

Then you'd better spend your time trying to lobby Sony, Apple, Microsoft, Fraunhoffer, the MPAA... instead of worrying about what license Sun frees its software under. You can blame the bad people who wrote these CODECs or you can look into the real incompatibilities between GPL and codecs, problems which LGPL, BSD, MPL and CDDL don't have:

It hurts Linux's stability by allowing Stallman and thousands of others to live in a fantasy world where GPL's viral nature overcomes Microsoft/Sony/Apple and other IP holders will bow to a non-paying 1% marketshare and make things convenient for this minority. It allows Linus to "not care about ABI stability" because he too lives this fantasy.

Nokia should get back to us when they finally realize what open-source is really all about.

Good point, and well made.

However, Freedom 5 anyone?

Oh, that one again? It's 2008 — time to re-tire that M$ talking point. I suppose that Ken Thompson's presentation from 24 years ago is also not an endorsement of Open Source? Re-read A5-0264/2001 and European Commission technology strategy They're quite clear and the 2001 resolution even pre-dates the main start of MS EU-level lobbying efforts.

If M$ wanted to play, it's executives could decide to release product code as open source, but the company hasn't. Further, it can't. M$ products just aren't engineered for security. In fact, M$ code is so bad that it threatens US national security. So, although ditching M$ products won't in and of itself make your site secure, it's a necessary first step.

It's about security and for that you need open source.

The Ms-PL (and also the other license) are an interesting read. Nearly half of the text is about software patents. First it says:

Let's play out this license in a different setting. What happens if I contribute and Microsoft or a third party like SCO or Novell sues me? In this case the license allows me to withdraw my software patents. But I don't have any software patents! LOL

There is an article about Ms-PL and patents on Oreillynet.com which confirms my concerns. Furthermore the article points out that only contributors have these rights. If you are a user of the software, the license doesn't offer you protection against software patents at all. Well. I certainly prefer the GPL which allows me to withdraw my contribution if patent claims are made by Microsoft or a third party.

Who said anything about Windows? Of course you can't legally fork Windows, because Microsoft has not licensed the Windows source code under its "Shared Source" initiative. You can't fix bugs in Windows, either. But that's irrelevant, because both the article and the post to which I responded talk specifically about source code which Microsoft releases under one of its "Shared Source" licenses. And for that source code, the answer is yes, you can fix bugs and release a competing product.

Can we do so in a manner that no longer requires anyone to pay Microsoft?

If you read the OSI's explanation of the shared source licenses, you'll see that Ms-PL and Ms-RL are more competition-friendly than most of the traditional open source licenses because they also indemnify all contributors against patent infringement. So you wouldn't be legally obliged to pay Microsoft anything if you wanted to rebrand their code and release a competing product.

Who said anything about Windows? Of course you can't legally fork Windows, because Microsoft has not licensed the Windows source code under its "Shared Source" initiative. You can't fix bugs in Windows, either. But that's irrelevant, because both the article and the post to which I responded talk specifically about source code which Microsoft releases under one of its "Shared Source" licenses. And for that source code, the answer is yes, you can fix bugs and release a competing product.

Can we do so in a manner that no longer requires anyone to pay Microsoft?

If you read the OSI's explanation of the shared source licenses, you'll see that Ms-PL and Ms-RL are more competition-friendly than most of the traditional open source licenses because they also indemnify all contributors against patent infringement. So you wouldn't be legally obliged to pay Microsoft anything if you wanted to rebrand their code and release a competing product.

Sorry, the link was just to the OSI homepage. The direct link to the definition is: http://opensource.org/docs/osd

And remember, just as FSF defined what Free Software is, the OSI people defined what Open Source means. That any random newbie now believes he can redefine what Open Source means is irrelevant.

"Shared source" IS open source.

Uh, no, it isn't. Microsoft knows very well why they call it shared source, and not open source. If you want to know why, read the definition of open source, or just shut the f* up.

This fact is more obvious when you look at the largest logos, e.g. opensource-550x475.gif. In this logo you can clearly see that the TM applies to the logo, not to the words "Open Source". The smaller logos deceptively make it look like the TM applies to the whole thing (and it SORT OF does - but to the graphic representation of the phrase "Open Source", and not the phrase itself.)

I did the research into this issue when the OSI announced its intention to "crack down" on vendors who "misuse" the term Open Source. That issue, and the comments in the slashdot story made me somewhat nauseous (and still do.) I subsequently wrote a journal entry detailing the situation. I've since exchanged comments with Bruce Perens, who defends his stance on redefining the term from what it used to be. Rather than taking responsibility for selection of an already-overloaded piece of terminology, Mr. Perens insists that he is correct and that the OSI (and by extension and some truly addled logic, the entire computing community) is the injured party here.

In reality there is no injured party, just some geeks with an overdeveloped sense of their own importance. Arguably, that includes myself; but then, I'm trying to preserve history, not rewrite it.

By what definition? How about The Open Source definition? They did kind of coin the term, after all. In which case you're wrong.

Yes, you're missing something quite fundamental. The term "Open Source" is a trademark. You can't use it without permission of the OSI, and they've set the criteria of what qualifies as "Open Source". Most of the Microsoft "Shared Source" licenses do not qualify and thus can not be called "Open Source".