[OSGeo-Discuss] GDAL and ESRI

[Rafal Wawer]

HI Ravi,
There is a nice term describing how GPL works - "viral effect". If you "touch" GPL you will be GPeLd to GPL yourself.
Unlike the flue ... there is not cure (-;

Best regards:
RAf


Dr. Rafal Wawer
K.U.Leuven
R&D Division SADL (Spatial Application Division)
Celestijnenlaan 200e bus 2224
BE-3001 Leuven-Heverlee
Belgium
tel. 0032 16 329731






________________________________
From: discuss-bounces at lists.osgeo.org [mailto:discuss-bounces at lists.osgeo.org] On Behalf Of Andrew Ross
Sent: 08 November 2009 16:50
To: OSGeo Discussions
Subject: Re: [OSGeo-Discuss] GDAL and ESRI

Hi All,

Adding to this discussion, there are a spectrum of open source licenses measured in terms of what they allow to derivative works. At one end of the spectrum, the GPL stipulates that if you base your software on a component that is licensed with the GPL license *and* distribute it, that derivative work must be licensed under the GPL license.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are licenses that are very liberal in terms of what they allow - BSD and MIT are good examples of this. Reusing a component licensed under the BSD or MIT license does affect a derivative work.

In terms of the GPL, distribution is a key. If you do not distribute your derivative work, then it does not become GPL. An example of this would be strictly in-house use, or developing a web based service. The exception, be aware there is a different class of the GPL, the Affero GPL that applies in the case of web services. With this license, you do not have to redistribute to trigger the "GPL contamination" - building a web service is enough to do so.

There's a good video on what you should look out for and relative merits of various licenses here: http://www.fosslc.org/drupal/node/523 The 3 licenses discussed in this video are at opposite ends and roughly in the middle of the above spectrum.

Andrew

2009/11/7 Yves Jacolin (free) <yjacolin at free.fr<mailto:yjacolin at free.fr>>
Le samedi 07 novembre 2009, Ravi a écrit :
> How come ESRI uses GDAL too, does open source support closed source too.

Hi,

It depends the OS Licence. GDAL licence is BSD-Like  [1].

Some other are usinng GPL-LIKe licence. This kind of licence does not allow
closed source to user open source licence. They need to "open" their source
using a GPL-Like licence [2].

This is quiet complicated ;)

Y.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BSD_licenses
[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License
--
Yves Jacolin
-------------
"Donner la liberté aux individus ne suffit pas, il faut aussi leur donner du
pouvoir, de la puissance d'agir." M Gauchet

"Give freedom to people is not enough, we also have to give them the power
to use this freedom, to act". M Gauchet
-------------
http://yjacolin.gloobe.org
http://softlibre.gloobe.org
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Andrew
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