xml-dev - Re: SAX2: Which license?

[John Cowan <cowan@locke.ccil.org>]

David Megginson scripsit:

> As we move to SAX2, I was wondering what licensing we should use?  Is
> public domain still OK?  It is *very* important to me, at least, that
> SAX's license be as friendly as possible to commercial software
> developers, so the GPL is out (though the LGPL might be OK).  MPL
> looks pretty good as well.  I'm not much of a licensing wonk, though,
> and would be grateful for advice from those who have spent more time
> thinking about this kind of thing.

I recommend one of the following licenses:

	BSD (minimum restrictions, GPL-compatible)
	LGPL (can be incorporated into closed-source programs,
		GPL-style for the code itself, can convert to GPL)
	MPL + GPL dual licensing (can be incorporated into closed-source
		programs, BSD-style for the code itself, GPL dual license
		provides compatibility)
	QPL + GPL (similar to MPL + GPL, but requires distribution of
		patches only, not modified versions)
	David Brownell's license + GPL (not yet officially OSI-compliant,
		similar to QPL + GPL, specifically designed for Java)

The importance of the GPL-compatible requirement is that the majority of
open source software is GPL.  Code whose sole license is incompatible
with the GPL (MPL, QPL, e.g.) cannot be used in such programs.
As the author, though, you can license your code in two different ways
even though they are incompatible.


-- 
John Cowan                                   cowan@ccil.org
       I am a member of a civilization. --David Brin

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