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Message-ID: <19e0530f0512050645y1f6d1925p8df8b95571ffba14@mail.gmail.com>
Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 09:45:58 -0500
From: Davanum Srinivas <davanum@gmail.com>
Reply-To: dims@apache.org
To: Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org>
Subject: Re: [Licensing/Community] Fresh start
Cc: harmony-dev@incubator.apache.org
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References: <19e0530f0512041050h62dad4b3v6bace1e1886cd68d@mail.gmail.com>
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Mark,

Personally, i'd like to see progress on the "VM Interface" ASAP, that
would go a long way to removing the mistrust. That would enable
harmony VM to use unmodified classpath stuff as-is for development
purposes and can act as a firewall till the licenses get sorted out.

See snippet from Leo's email:
"Mark told me someone tried something like that a year or two ago
already. I forgot whom or what it was called, but I'd suggest trying
to learn about it and if it failed, why."

If i see some componentization such that i can drop in say
xalan/xerces and not use classpath's built-in stuff (this would end
users can mix and match stuff to make their distribution) that would
be even better. But "VM Interface" is priority #1.

Thanks,
dims

On 12/5/05, Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
> Hi Davanum,
>
> On Sun, 2005-12-04 at 13:50 -0500, Davanum Srinivas wrote:
> > Just remember, it has to go both ways :) Apache code in classpath and
> > classpath code in Harmony. We can't just push things so that it is a
> > one way street. So far what i have not heard is how/what can be done
> > to enable Classpath to use the tons of jakarta code and other Apache
> > code.
> >
> > How about a plan of attack? Anthony, Dalibor and Mark can try hard to
> > lobby FSF's GPL v3 effort to be as compatible as possible with ASL
> > 2.0? In the mean while, we can take up Stefano's offer of working on a
> > VM interface. If we get thru in one piece till GPL v3 gets out, then
> > we can investigate if Classpath can switch to use Xerces/Xalan etc
> > from Apache. In the parallel, let's see how LGPL bridge policy works
> > in the real world usage (once Apache-Legal formulates it and announces
> > it). At that point we can eval options on both sides and see how best
> > to go forward.
>
> Thanks for pointing out the obvious. I have been reading a lot, but not
> really found I way to make sense of where/why we aren't working more
> together as a team :{ I changed the subject a little because I believe
> this is not just some "legal/licensing" thing. It feels much more like a
> community thing. Somehow we seem to mistrust each other. And I don't
> really know how that happened. Ever since I became maintainer of GNU
> Classpath I have worked hard to enlarge the community and work together
> by cooperating with as many existing communities as possible. That was
> also my intention when I joined the Harmony initiative. But instead of
> having created a larger community we seem to have created communities
> that are unsure of the goals of the other. While at the same time we do
> seem to have the same goal, but we are not acting like we are.
>
> I think we should split up the "legal/community" issues into the
> following "subprojects" (I already tried to discuss this in private with
> some people to get a better understanding, but maybe it is better to
> throw this out into the group). Each of these points is not just a
> "licensing" issue, but also a "community" issue since I feel that we can
> only solve it if we understand why the different communities feel these
> things are important. I have tried to explain it from "my side" a bit
> below. Input on other viewpoints are very welcome.
>
> - Understanding the acceptable dependencies of code distributed under
> various licenses for the various groups. For GNU projects and most other
> Free Software projects I know it is mostly anything goes as long as it
> is upwards compatible with the GPL (with a preference on the FSF to have
> a clear legal trail and possible copyright assignment). [Unfortunately
> this doesn't include the ASL which is one of the main sticking points.
> And why various people have asked the key contributors to make sure
> their contributions are (also) available under GPL-compatible terms.
> Geir has been talking to IBM about this.] The precise "rules" for the
> ASF seem still under heavy discussion. Maybe this will be discussed more
> at the ApacheCon next week.
>
> - Starting from the understanding of the point above it would be good to
> get a clear view of how the LGPL fits into that. It looks like many
> Apache projects would like to build upon existing LGPL code bases, but
> are not sure what the requirements are. I know we talked a lot about
> this before, but I am not clear where we stand, or which uncertainties
> still seem to exist. This is probably not possible to do before the
> previous item is clearly understood. But if it is resolved and
> acceptable to the apache community then we can certainly look into
> making sure GNU Classpath code is also available under the LGPL, but see
> next point.
>
> - The FSF has been using exceptions for runtime libraries for
> GCC, like the one for GNU Classpath, to the GPL. The intent was to have
> a more easy to understand license for these kind of runtime libraries
> which is similar in spirit to the LGPL, but with a couple of freedoms
> removed (especially the relinking/shared library requirement for the end
> user). But it seems this exception is even less well understood then the
> LGPL even though people seem to have been using such runtime libraries
> for a very years through GCC. We can have a long debate about the
> precise legal wording, but it is unclear why there is so much
> confusion/distrust about the intent in some groups. Long time GCC users
> and distributors don't seem to have any doubts about it as far as I can
> see. When the LGPL issue is resolved it will probably be easy to solve
> this one also.
>
> - In the long run it would be good to get the ASL and GPL compatible
> through the GPLv3 process. This does not help us in the short term
> though (release date 2007). I talked to various FSF people, including
> Richard Stallman, and the goal clearly is to get them compatible through
> the process (even if it is too early to tell whether or not that can
> happen as is, or whether there are also small changes needed to the
> ASL). Richard asked me to make sure the people were aware of that and
> participate in this process. http://gplv3.fsf.org/
>
> - Seeing that the GPLv3 process will take more than a year, is there any
> way to create temporary bridges between code bases distributed under the
> various licenses? Some clear wording to unambiguously make ASLv2 and
> GPLv2 code mixable would be nice. I have no idea if that is possible. It
> was clearly the intent of the ASLv2 to make this possible, but I don't
> know if there is any simple clarification to make this also legally so.
>
> What do people think of the above? Are these the things that are truly
> blocking participation between the groups? They feel a bit too
> legal-mumble-jumbo to me, but I don't know how to reword them more as
> community participation issues.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Mark
>
>
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--
Davanum Srinivas : http://wso2.com/blogs/