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Date: Wed, 11 Jul 2007 07:06:41 -0700
From: Daniel John Debrunner <djd@apache.org>
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Subject: Re: [VOTE] New ASF/JCP Policies
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Bill Barker wrote:
> "Daniel John Debrunner" <djd@apache.org> wrote 
> in message news:46945594.1030508@apache.org...
>> William A. Rowe, Jr. wrote:
>>> Daniel John Debrunner wrote:
>> Thanks for the detailed answers. Just to confirm, I'm not suggesting any 
>> of these actions for the ASF, I'm trying to understand the legal status of 
>> each. So while dropping harmony is probably not an option for us, it is an 
>> interesting counterpoint to the other options when just looking at the 
>> legal status.
>>
>>>>>> 2) Release harmony with FOU restrictions. Preserves Sun's monopoly in
>>>>>> the embedded space for Java(tm) technology.
>>> That's not acceptable; the ASF does not release software with 
>>> restrictions
>>> beyond the scope of the Apache License v2.0.  And further it grants Sun
>>> a monopoly to use ASF code (and check your J2SE distribution, it's there)
>>> for their exclusive financial benefit.  This option is worrysome from the
>>> PoV of our 501(c)3 status, even if we tolerated it.
>> I asked this once & got no reply. How could Sun use the harmony code for 
>> their exclusive financial benefit? They would be subject to the same 
>> licence terms as everyone else (remember it's not released under the ALv2 
>> in this case, but under some licence with the FOU restrictions). I think 
>> it's a pretty safe bet that non of the harmony code is under Sun's 
>> copyright :-), so they can't change the licence.
>>
> 
> Without certifying, Harmony isn't officially a Java SE impementation.  It is 
> a sort-of-like-Java-thingy, much like MS's Java.net, that compiles the Java 
> code into some sort of byte code that may or not be able to be read by a 
> complient JVM.
> 
> The ASF license allows branching at no cost, so 
> <strong>hypothetically</strong>, Sun could branch the Harmony code and then 
> develop it under any (sub-)license they choose.  Basically, they would do 
> the same thing that they did with GlassFish.  They own the license to the 
> TCK, so <strong>hypothetically</strong> could could pass the tests on their 
> own.

I understand that, but in this hypothetical situation I'm asking the 
question about harmony *is* certified and is *not* being released under 
the ALv2, but instead a a licence that has restrictions that would also 
apply to Sun. So the question remains unanswered.

If you mean above that Sun could branch the current harmony code (as it 
is under ALv2) then that's true regardless of if harmony is released 
with an FOU restriction or not. So that means that releasing harmony 
with FOU restrictions does not impact our 501(c)3 status, which is a 
claim that is being made by some.

Dan.