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SQL-Ledger Relicensed, Community Gagged
Posted by
kdawson
on Sun Apr 15, 2007 02:38 PM
from the i-can't-heear-you dept.
from the i-can't-heear-you dept.
Ashley Gittins writes "Users of the popular accounting package SQL-Ledger were being kept in the dark about a recent license change. Two weeks ago a new version of the software was released but along with it came the silent change of license from GPLv2 to the 'SQL-Ledger Open Source License' — presumably in an effort to prevent future forks like LedgerSMB. As it turns out, the author was making deliberate attempts to prevent the community from finding out about the license change. No posts to the SQL-Ledger mailing lists asking about the license change were getting past moderation and direct questions to the author were going unanswered. Just recently the license was switched back to GPLv2. This behavior is not a first for this particular project, and is part of the reason for the original LedgerSMB fork. Does a project maintainer have an ethical obligation to notify his or her community of a license change? What about a legal obligation?"
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Oh no! (Score:5, Funny)
Legal obligation? Probably not... Ethical? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Legal obligation? Probably not... Ethical? (Score:5, Insightful)
No. There's only a problem if someone made a fork and tried to change it from GPL to something else. This was a move by the guy who holds the copyrights to the code. the copyright holder can, at anytime, decide he wants to move his code to another license. the catch is that all previously released code is still under the previous license. That is, if i release Foobar v1 under the GPL, then I release Foobar v1.1 under BSD, v1.0 remains licensed under the GPL, and you are free to take that code and start your own version, Forkbar v1.0. However, you must always keep it as GPL, because you don't own the copyright on the code; you only have access to it because of the GPL.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Legal obligation? Probably not... Ethical? (Score:5, Insightful)
* Retroactively re-license existing versions from the GPL to the new version: * Unlaterally re-license code that includes third part submissions, since most of the translation packages were done by user submission.
Ignoring those two actions, even if the license change is strictly legal, it's downright underhanded to pull a stunt like he did. He didn't just change the license on his software; he put out a point release on the primary distribution site, after having changed the license terms included with the package, then refused to let anyone bring it up on the official support mailing list. How many of us would notice if we downloaded and installed the lastest apache or postfix or whatever, and the license had silently and magically changed to a closed one?
Parent
Update and reply (Score:5, Informative)
In the time since this was submitted, Mr Simader has seen the light and reverted to the GPL, albeit very unhappily. Such is life.
I don't actually begrudge Mr Simader the right to choose whatever copyright license he wants to have for his work. That is his moral right, and I have no problem with it. However, I was very unhappy with the fact that a lot of contributors' code, including all the translations, were still licensed under the GPL and since his new license was not compatable with it, I felt that he was causing problems for everyone including our project which is why I began contacting contributors privately about the whole thing.
Also, in the event of a license change away from a specific and well-understood OSI-approved license, I think that the developer also needs to give users a heads-up before they install the new version. This is, however, as far as I see the ethical obligations. And even these were not followed.
Finally, on the LedgerSMB project we are committed to rewriting the entire application, not just in order to prevent further conflict with Mr Simader but also in order to create a better program and one which can be more easily maintained. But we would be remiss if we didn't recognize that our success is in fact partly based on his.
Parent
Re:Legal obligation? Probably not... Ethical? (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:Legal obligation? Probably not... Ethical? (Score:4, Insightful)
The author of the work can always release his work under any license he sees fit. The problem would be any code contributed by others in this case.
Parent
Relicensing... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
They can do whatever they like in the future. And anyone can take the entire GPL'd code base from the day before the license change and tell the "owner" to go fork himself.
That in itself counts as one of the best reasons to use GPL'd software - Eternal compatibility, as long as someone, anyone, continues work on the older codebase (which may mean nothing more than compiling it as-it-stands once every
Reading comprehension (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Legal: No, Ethical: Maybe... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Legal: No, Ethical: Maybe... (Score:5, Insightful)
That doesn't always work either. Just read the EULA for, well, pretty much any piece of commercial software. If the vendor disappears, decides not to support the product, if it vaporizes your computer and most of the building its in
Parent
Looks like the project is officially being killed. (Score:3, Informative)
Definitely unethical (Score:5, Insightful)
Simader (Score:4, Informative)
Finally the death of his project.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Where to you think the LedgerSMB form came from? (Score:3, Interesting)
I think the root problem is that the SQL Ledger guy didn't realise what Open Source meant when he 'opened' it. LedgerSMB seems more focused on simply being a reasonable product, and their focus is the SME market who coul dnever afford the gazillion dollar programs..
Not a Unique Phenomenon (Score:4, Informative)
Needless to say, I'm never using PDFlib again, and I'm re-writing all of my code to use FPDF (http://www.fpdf.org), which is free, and works just as well. It's even easier to write code for. Stay away from PDFlib!
Re:Not a Unique Phenomenon (Score:4, Insightful)
Never, ever, ever buy third party libraries without source. Without source you no longer own the solution you create. I have seen it happen many times before and these days I put a lot of pressure of the library vendor with the hard rule, "No source no Sale". Many of these third party library providers have gone out of business or shifted focus to other products. Without source I would be in trouble.
Never, ever, ever buy any software at all that licenses against a specific set of hardware.
Lately I more often contemplating switching OS to get away from the worst black box of all... "Windows" With Vista and the brain dead security rules introduced it becomes impossible to write software.
Parent
TLUG (Score:4, Informative)
http://tlug.ss.org/wiki/Meetings:2007-04 [ss.org]
The talk was by a Ledger SMB core developer.
I bought what he said... Ledger SMB is now on Source Forge, reacts to security issues,
accepts patches, is converting to a saner architecture, uses CURRENCY instead of FLOAT for money.
Seems like its a winner.
Other Accounts Packages (Score:5, Informative)
* Front Accounting
* Ledger SMB
* WebERP
* OpenAccounting
* TurboCash
o Windows
* GnuCash
* Personal
o HomeBank
o jGnash
o GFP
o Grisbi
* CK-Ledger
* Compiere
* Lazy8
* Quasar
o Linux Canada
* phpCOIN
* opentaps
* Bambooinvoice
* GnuAccounting
* phpOrganisation
* OpenBravo
They are in various states of repair and different markets from the personal to the one man band to the multinational.
Re:Can we please lay off the emotional language (Score:4, Informative)
I think the bottomline appears to be that the guy Open Sourced something and didn't quite understood the consequences. And it's easy to stack mistake on mistake once you're on the wrong foot..
Having followed both mailing lists I must say that the LedgerSMB one is very lively indeed - and has more people visible in development. That doesn't mean I don't feel sorry for the original author, but I think he may need a bit of a spokesperson between him and the rest of the world..
Parent
Re:Can we please lay off the emotional language (Score:4, Insightful)
"That doesn't mean I don't feel sorry for the original author, but I think he may need a bit of a spokesperson between him and the rest of the world.."
Deiter may have switched the license back to GPLv2, but at this point, why bother ... he's done more to promote the competing fork as being the "legit, safe" one than anything else.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)