[GRASS5] why GPL

[Markus Neteler]

On Thu, Mar 22, 2001 at 07:03:59AM -0800, strobe anarkhos wrote:
> Why is GRASS licensed under the GPL? I would think the LGPL would be far
> more appropriate.
> 
> It is possible for the authors of the original code to re-release their
> code under the LGPL or another license. If we decide to restructure GRASS
> I think this would be a very very good idea. People who may want to write
> plugings (views, commands (and other controllers), etc.) for the GRASS
> framework I propose may want to use their own license. If the code is only
> released in GPL form that's not allowed given the current (read: RMS)
> interpretation of the GPL.
> 
> If however it were licensed under the LGPL people could use the framework
> without making their code GPL. I mean what if somebody wants to write an
> intricate shareware view for a particular platform? Nobody is forced to
> use his view and custom controllers, but some may want to even if they
> don't get the source. Changes to the GRASS framework would of course have
> to be LGPL licensed (which is the purpose of the license).
> 
> I consider this a serious issue which I hope I find common ground with. I
> suspect GRASS was released under the GPL because the LGPL hadn't been
> written yet.

At least the GRASS I/O routines shall be released under LGPL. When
restructuring GRASS, we'll make use of Frank Warmerdam's "libgrass".
Like that proprietary products will be allowed to read/write GRASS
databases directly. See the libgrass link at:
 http://www.geog.uni-hannover.de/grass/related_projects.html

Generally I feel that GPL is a quite good license for GRASS. We have
quite good experience with that.

Regards

 Markus Neteler

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