[GRASS5] libgrass license?

[Radim Blazek]

On Wednesday 03 December 2003 01:51, Frank Warmerdam wrote:
> Hamish wrote:
> > One would have to check that the included "majority of the GRASS libgis,
> > and libdatetime" is only old public domain code and not newer GPL
> > additions, which cannot be arbitrarily re-licensed by a 3rd party as
> > LGPL, AFAIK.
>
> Hamish,
>
> It is true that libgrass should likely be GPL, not LGPL.
>
> > Surely the file format isn't that complicated that GRASS libraries have
> > to be used for read/write. The programmer's manual should provide enough
> > info for a clean non-GPL library to be written, even if it is a pain to
> > reproduce working code. (which would be the GRASS++ library, which would
> > eventually be destined to be included with GDAL/OGR under the MIT/X
> > license?)
> >
> > Currently GDAL skirts the issue by not including libgrass.
> > They should be careful about what options their official binaries
> > include though.
>
> Well, it would be interesting to see who has the legal resources to sue me
> if I distribute a GDAL build with libgrass support included.  Somehow I
> doubt anyone is sufficiently interested.
>
> That said, the GPL nature of the GRASS 5 code base, and the licensing
> complications that implies are part of why I haven't spent much time
> updating libgrass and libgrass support in GDAL.

Yes, I think that you had violated the license and so you have lost 
the rights to use GRASS 5. We use GPL, because it attracts users 
and developers to use GRASS and to contribute to GRASS project ;-)

I don't think that any GRASS developer has will and sources to sue you.
Maybe Bernhard and FSF? What do you think Bernhard, could we ask FSF to help
us to solve Frank's GRASS license infringement?


Radim