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Posted to log4j-dev@logging.apache.org by Mark Masterson <ma...@d2mail.de> on 2003/05/18 13:59:51 UTC
What constitutes a violation of the Apache license?
Greetings!
I could use some advice/guidance regarding the license. A company seems to
have taken my Apache licensed idea and are selling it in a commercial
product as their own.
As most of you will know, I am the author of the SNMPTrapAppender,
maintained at my Web site, here:
http://www.m2technologies.net/asp/snmpTrapAppender.asp
Last week, a Google search turned up this:
http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet
/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html
<http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventne
t/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html>
http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/j_snmp_traps.html
You can, perhaps, imagine my surprise, since Id known nothing about this
class of AdventNets. I downloaded their agent toolkit, and decompiled
their SNMPTrapAppender using JAD. The following appears to be the
situation:
* they have based their class on mine. The class name, many of the
method, and parameter names are all the same.
* they have for lack of a better word stolen my JavaDoc
documentation. Large portions of their documentation is word-for-word
identical with mine.
* They do *not*, however, appear to be using my source code directly.
The decompiled class resembles mine only superficially. At worst, they took
a very early version of my class and developed away from it.
What can I, or should I do? Ive written to the company the text of my
mail to them is attached below. Im not really interested in getting into a
conflict with these people, but Im not too thrilled about what seems to
have happened here. Am I overreacting? Underreacting? :-)
What do you guys think? Id appreciate any suggestions.
Cheers,
Mark
Hello Peter,
>>Or send me your requirement in an e-mail and we can respond to you.<<
I would be glad to explain my interest in the Agent Toolkit, but I doubt
that you are going to like my answer.
I am the author of the SNMPTrapAppender, an Open Source add-on for the
Jakarta Log4J logging tool. The appender allows an application to send
Log4J formatted logging events as traps. See here:
http://www.m2technologies.net/asp/snmpTrapAppender.asp
Interestingly (from your perspective, perhaps) I developed the very first
version of this code using the AdventNet toolkit, more than two years ago.
Due to concerns about licensing, openness, etc. expressed by the Log4J team,
however, I soon switched over to using freely available, open-source SNMP
libraries; i.e. OpenNMSs JoeSNMP, NetSNMP and Wengsofts library.
Last week, much to my surprise, I stumbled across the following:
http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet
/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html
<http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventne
t/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html>
And this
http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/j_snmp_traps.html
. You can imagine my surprise when I noticed that portions of the JavaDoc
s at the first URI are identical, word-for-word, with the documentation for
my appender. The name of your class is also exactly the same, as are many
of the method and parameter names.
Hmmm
. I promptly downloaded your toolkit, and then decompiled your
SNMPTrapAppender using JAD. It appears that you are not using my code
directly at most, someone took a very early version of my class, and
developed away from it. Thus, it does not seem that one can accuse your
company of being in direct violation of the Apache license. Although you do
not mention me or my code anywhere in your documentation, you do not seem to
be using my code directly. Your company has clearly based this class on my
idea, and someone has clearly stolen my documentation and used it as your
own.
I will be writing to the Jakarta folks to ask them for advice about the
situation.
In the meantime, Id like to suggest the following. Your SNMPTrapAppender
is a bit primitive the newest version of mine surpasses it in features. I
believe that you are doing your users a disservice by taking this path.
Here is an alternative:
The current version of my appender uses a pluggable architecture to allow
for (theoretically) the use of any concrete implementation of an SNMP
library. Why dont we work together to develop such a class (an
SnmpTrapSender in my terminology) that uses AdventNet? This class would
then simply use my Jar. You could then, under the terms of the Apache
License, simply distribute that class, together with my Jar. You would lose
no functionality versus your current situation, and you would automatically
profit from changes/improvements made in my appender.
I look forward to your response.
Cheers,
Mark Masterson
M2 Technologies
http://www.m2technologies.net
Re: What constitutes a violation of the Apache license?
Posted by Ceki Gülcü <ce...@qos.ch>.
If you chose to distribute your work under the terms of the Apache
license, the terms of the Apache Software License apply. In
particular, the second clause:
* 2. 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.
AndventNet must acknowledge that their work is based on yours. They must
also reproduce the Apache license with the documentation
and/or other materials provided with their software, which I presume
they distribute in binary form. Otherwise, they are in breach of
your copyright.
If as you say,they copied the javadocs and other material word for word, then
we are a confronted with a manifest case of plagiarism and subsequently
your offensive position should be pretty strong. Copyright law is quite
restrictive in the sense that it protects the author's expression of
an idea but not the idea itself (that's where patent law comes into
play). However, when applicable, copyright law is very much in favor of
the author. Without appropriate license or explicit permission from
you AndventNet has absolutely no right to reproduce your work.
What you do next depends on you. Before initiating any legal action, I would
strongly suggest that you consult with a lawyer.
I am not a lawyer. Thus, please treat the above statements with a fair
amount of circumspection.
At 01:59 PM 5/18/2003 +0200, you wrote:
>Greetings!
>
>
>
>I could use some advice/guidance regarding the license. A company seems
>to have taken my Apache licensed idea and are selling it in a commercial
>product as their own.
>
>
>
>As most of you will know, I am the author of the SNMPTrapAppender,
>maintained at my Web site, here:
>
>
>
>http://www.m2technologies.net/asp/snmpTrapAppender.asp
>
>
>
>Last week, a Google search turned up this:
>
>
>
><http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html>http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html
>
>http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/j_snmp_traps.html
>
>
>
>You can, perhaps, imagine my surprise, since Id known nothing about this
>class of AdventNets. I downloaded their agent toolkit, and decompiled
>their SNMPTrapAppenderusing JAD. The following appears to be the situation:
>
>
>
>n they have based their class on mine. The class name, many of the
>method, and parameter names are all the same.
>
>n they have for lack of a better word stolen my JavaDoc
>documentation. Large portions of their documentation is word-for-word
>identical with mine.
>
>n They do *not*, however, appear to be using my source code
>directly. The decompiled class resembles mine only superficially. At
>worst, they took a very early version of my class and developed away from it.
>
>
>
>What can I, or should I do? Ive written to the company the text of my
>mail to them is attached below. Im not really interested in getting into
>a conflict with these people, but Im not too thrilled about what seems to
>have happened here. Am I overreacting? Underreacting? J
>
>
>
>What do you guys think? Id appreciate any suggestions.
>
>
>
>Cheers,
>
>Mark
>
>
>
>Hello Peter,
>
>
>
> >>Or send me your requirement in an e-mail and we can respond to you.<<
>
>
>
>I would be glad to explain my interest in the Agent Toolkit, but I doubt
>that you are going to like my answer.
>
>
>
>I am the author of the SNMPTrapAppender, an Open Source add-on for the
>Jakarta Log4J logging tool. The appender allows an application to send
>Log4J formatted logging events as traps. See here:
>
>
>
>http://www.m2technologies.net/asp/snmpTrapAppender.asp
>
>
>
>Interestingly (from your perspective, perhaps) I developed the very first
>version of this code using the AdventNet toolkit, more than two years
>ago. Due to concerns about licensing, openness, etc. expressed by the
>Log4J team, however, I soon switched over to using freely available,
>open-source SNMP libraries; i.e. OpenNMSs JoeSNMP, NetSNMP and Wengsofts
>library.
>
>
>
>Last week, much to my surprise, I stumbled across the following:
>
>
>
><http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html>http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/javadocs/com/adventnet/utils/appender/SNMPTrapAppender.html
>
>
>
>& And this &
>
>
>
>http://www.adventnet.com/products/javaagent/help/snmp/j_snmp_traps.html
>
>
>
>&. You can imagine my surprise when I noticed that portions of the
>JavaDocs at the first URI are identical, word-for-word, with the
>documentation for my appender. The name of your class is also exactly the
>same, as are many of the method and parameter names.
>
>
>
>Hmmm&. I promptly downloaded your toolkit, and then decompiled your
>SNMPTrapAppender using JAD. It appears that you are not using my code
>directly at most, someone took a very early version of my class, and
>developed away from it. Thus, it does not seem that one can accuse your
>company of being in direct violation of the Apache license. Although you
>do not mention me or my code anywhere in your documentation, you do not
>seem to be using my code directly. Your company has clearly based this
>class on my idea, and someone has clearly stolen my documentation and used
>it as your own.
>
>
>
>I will be writing to the Jakarta folks to ask them for advice about the
>situation.
>
>
>
>In the meantime, Id like to suggest the following. Your SNMPTrapAppender
>is a bit primitive the newest version of mine surpasses it in features. I
>believe that you are doing your users a disservice by taking this
>path. Here is an alternative:
>
>
>
>The current version of my appender uses a pluggable architecture to allow
>for (theoretically) the use of any concrete implementation of an SNMP
>library. Why dont we work together to develop such a class (an
>SnmpTrapSenderin my terminology) that uses AdventNet? This class would
>then simply use my Jar. You could then, under the terms of the Apache
>License, simply distribute that class, together with my Jar. You would
>lose no functionality versus your current situation, and you would
>automatically profit from changes/improvements made in my appender.
>
>
>
>I look forward to your response.
>
>
>
>Cheers,
>
>Mark Masterson
>
>M2 Technologies
>
>http://www.m2technologies.net
>
>
--
Ceki For log4j documentation consider "The complete log4j manual"
ISBN: 2970036908 http://www.qos.ch/shop/products/clm_t.jsp
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