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Posted to fop-dev@xmlgraphics.apache.org by Charles Marcus <Ch...@Media-Brokers.com> on 2002/04/04 15:34:53 UTC
License Issue Inquiry
Greetings,
I hope this is the proper place for this question to be submitted. If
not, please direct me to where I need to go.
I am taking it upon myself to submit a query regarding the Apache
Software License that FOP is licensed under.
There is some big interest currently in the OOo (OpenOffice.org)
community with respect to finding a cross-platform, uniform and
integrated method for providing PDF document creation, and FOP looks
like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
What would be required in order to allow a version of FOP to be
licensed/sub-licensed/dual-licensed under the LGPL?
I am not subscribed to the list so would appreciate any replies to be
cc'd directly to me at:
charlesm@media-brokers.com
Thanks!
Charles Marcus
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by alex <al...@yahoo.com>.
>From: "Charles Marcus" <Ch...@Media-Brokers.com>
> > I am taking it upon myself to submit a query regarding the Apache
> > Software License that FOP is licensed under.
> >
> > There is some big interest currently in the OOo (OpenOffice.org)
> > community with respect to finding a cross-platform, uniform and
> > integrated method for providing PDF document creation, and FOP looks
> > like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
> >
> > OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
> > available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
> >
> > What would be required in order to allow a version of FOP to be
> > licensed/sub-licensed/dual-licensed under the LGPL?
We recently had this discussion in reverse about the possibility of
incorporating iText PDF library into FOP. This is a non XSL:FO library
which helps you generate and process PDF files.
In the end I think we had to turn down iText's generous offer since its
code was licensed in an incompatible way with Apache FOP.
However if your OpenOffice code uses LGPL and iText uses LGPL I see no
problems.
http://www.lowagie.com/iText/
I guess the next question you need to ask yourself is do you require XSL:FO
capability?
Alex McLintock
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by alex <al...@yahoo.com>.
>From: "Charles Marcus" <Ch...@Media-Brokers.com>
> > I am taking it upon myself to submit a query regarding the Apache
> > Software License that FOP is licensed under.
> >
> > There is some big interest currently in the OOo (OpenOffice.org)
> > community with respect to finding a cross-platform, uniform and
> > integrated method for providing PDF document creation, and FOP looks
> > like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
> >
> > OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
> > available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
> >
> > What would be required in order to allow a version of FOP to be
> > licensed/sub-licensed/dual-licensed under the LGPL?
We recently had this discussion in reverse about the possibility of
incorporating iText PDF library into FOP. This is a non XSL:FO library
which helps you generate and process PDF files.
In the end I think we had to turn down iText's generous offer since its
code was licensed in an incompatible way with Apache FOP.
However if your OpenOffice code uses LGPL and iText uses LGPL I see no
problems.
http://www.lowagie.com/iText/
I guess the next question you need to ask yourself is do you require XSL:FO
capability?
Alex McLintock
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by Nicola Ken Barozzi <ni...@apache.org>.
I'm moving this to general@xml.apache.org because I think it's of interest
to all.
If not, please excuse me.
From: "Charles Marcus" <Ch...@Media-Brokers.com>
> Greetings,
>
> I hope this is the proper place for this question to be submitted. If
> not, please direct me to where I need to go.
>
> I am taking it upon myself to submit a query regarding the Apache
> Software License that FOP is licensed under.
>
> There is some big interest currently in the OOo (OpenOffice.org)
> community with respect to finding a cross-platform, uniform and
> integrated method for providing PDF document creation, and FOP looks
> like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
>
> OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
> available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
>
> What would be required in order to allow a version of FOP to be
> licensed/sub-licensed/dual-licensed under the LGPL?
The Apache license makes the code usable in any way, as long as you give
proper credit and don't blame Apache for problems.
AFAIK, the problem lies in the *GPL license, which is more restrictive; my
personal suggestion is to check the LGPL license and ask the authors of that
license. IIRC GNU states that Apache and *GNU licenses are incompatible for
them, but don't take my word for it.
Apache AFAIK releases code only under the Apache license.
> I am not subscribed to the list so would appreciate any replies to be
> cc'd directly to me at:
>
> charlesm@media-brokers.com
>
> Thanks!
>
> Charles Marcus
--
Nicola Ken Barozzi nicolaken@apache.org
- verba volant, scripta manent -
(discussions get forgotten, just code remains)
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by Nicola Ken Barozzi <ni...@apache.org>.
I'm moving this to general@xml.apache.org because I think it's of interest
to all.
If not, please excuse me.
From: "Charles Marcus" <Ch...@Media-Brokers.com>
> Greetings,
>
> I hope this is the proper place for this question to be submitted. If
> not, please direct me to where I need to go.
>
> I am taking it upon myself to submit a query regarding the Apache
> Software License that FOP is licensed under.
>
> There is some big interest currently in the OOo (OpenOffice.org)
> community with respect to finding a cross-platform, uniform and
> integrated method for providing PDF document creation, and FOP looks
> like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
>
> OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
> available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
>
> What would be required in order to allow a version of FOP to be
> licensed/sub-licensed/dual-licensed under the LGPL?
The Apache license makes the code usable in any way, as long as you give
proper credit and don't blame Apache for problems.
AFAIK, the problem lies in the *GPL license, which is more restrictive; my
personal suggestion is to check the LGPL license and ask the authors of that
license. IIRC GNU states that Apache and *GNU licenses are incompatible for
them, but don't take my word for it.
Apache AFAIK releases code only under the Apache license.
> I am not subscribed to the list so would appreciate any replies to be
> cc'd directly to me at:
>
> charlesm@media-brokers.com
>
> Thanks!
>
> Charles Marcus
--
Nicola Ken Barozzi nicolaken@apache.org
- verba volant, scripta manent -
(discussions get forgotten, just code remains)
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by John Austin <jo...@integerservices.no-ip.com>.
On Thursday 04 April 2002 14:47, you wrote:
> At 08:34 AM 4/4/02 -0500, Charles Marcus wrote:
> >like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
> license of it's software. My question is why does OOo require FOP to
> be LGPLed? You can integrate it into OpenOffice without it being
> LGPL.
You can't change the Apache license into LGPL but you can license YOUR
CODE under LGPL (or GPL or even MicroSloth EULA). This will require
anyone using YOUR CODE to observe LGPL (or whatever), which is what you
want to do, as I understand it. This would allow anyone else to extract
the Apache-licensed code out of your distribution and use it under
Apache terms, as long as they removed all of the LGPL code from it. Of
course, it would be easier to go out and get a pristine copy of FOp
instead. The only thing you can create license terms for is YOUR CODE
and then it still has to be provably original etc. etc.
> If you do this it would also be fair if you contribute changes to FOP
> back to the Apache tree.
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Re: License Issue Inquiry
Posted by Roland <ro...@netquant.com.br>.
At 08:34 AM 4/4/02 -0500, Charles Marcus wrote:
>like it could be the answer. The only question is, can OOo use it?
>
>OOo requires that anything integrated into its source code be made
>available to them under the terms of the LGPL license.
The LGPL license is much more restrictive than the Apache license which has
almost no restrictions at all.
AFAIK, there is no problem in integrating FOP into an LGPL product.
But if you want FOP to be licensed under LGPL you have a problem, because I
think that the Apache license doesn't allow changing the license of it's
software. My question is why does OOo require FOP to be LGPLed? You can
integrate it into OpenOffice without it being LGPL.
If you do this it would also be fair if you contribute changes to FOP back
to the Apache tree.
Just as another side note:
I consider the LGPL and GPL a bad license. LGPL projects can profit from
code under more liberal licenses like BSD, MIT, X11, Apache, but the other
way round is not possible. There are other drawbacks also...
Best regards, Roland
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