suggest addition of Maven-style redist to JCP templates

["Roy T. Fielding" <fi...@gbiv.com>]

Hi Geir,

As you probably know, Sun legal provides a template to the JCP for
the various specification licenses, and any deviation from that
template must be approved by Sun legal prior to publication by the PMO.
Unfortunately, the standard template is quite constraining and doesn't
allow redistribution of the API jar by third parties aside from
within independent implementations.

AFAICT, there is no reason for Sun to prevent a Spec Lead from allowing
redistribution of an API jar in its unmodified form for the purpose of
compiling stuff -- the compatibility restriction could be satisfied
by excluding further redistribution of the API jar (aside from under
other license terms granted by the spec lead, such as the Spec License).
The spec license already excludes sublicensing.

Would it be possible to ask the PMO to ask Sun legal to draft an
optional license term for the default template, such that it would
be possible for the Spec Lead to approve redistribution of the API
jar file from the Maven repositories (or such similar use) without
losing the other terms of the license?  I think that would solve
a lot of problems without generating too much fuss.

....Roy

Re: suggest addition of Maven-style redist to JCP templates

["Geir Magnusson Jr." <ge...@pobox.com>]

Roy T. Fielding wrote:
> Hi Geir,
> 
> As you probably know, Sun legal provides a template to the JCP for
> the various specification licenses, and any deviation from that
> template must be approved by Sun legal prior to publication by the PMO.
> Unfortunately, the standard template is quite constraining and doesn't
> allow redistribution of the API jar by third parties aside from
> within independent implementations.
> 
> AFAICT, there is no reason for Sun to prevent a Spec Lead from allowing
> redistribution of an API jar in its unmodified form for the purpose of
> compiling stuff -- the compatibility restriction could be satisfied
> by excluding further redistribution of the API jar (aside from under
> other license terms granted by the spec lead, such as the Spec License).
> The spec license already excludes sublicensing.
> 
> Would it be possible to ask the PMO to ask Sun legal to draft an
> optional license term for the default template, such that it would
> be possible for the Spec Lead to approve redistribution of the API
> jar file from the Maven repositories (or such similar use) without
> losing the other terms of the license?  I think that would solve
> a lot of problems without generating too much fuss.

Of course.  But, to avoid having us play "fetch me a rock", would you 
want to offer a "sketch" of what those terms might be?  By providing a 
concrete example to start, I think we'd converge faster to a solution.

geir

> 
> ....Roy
>