[GRASS5] putting v.in.dwg in "contrib"?

[Bernhard Reiter]

On Fri, May 16, 2003 at 06:07:58PM +0200, Radim Blazek wrote:
> On Friday 16 May 2003 05:26 pm, Helena Mitasova wrote:
> > With all that was written by Markus and others, Bernhard do you still
> > see a problem with keeping v.in.dgw in experimental GRASS5.1 in
> > src.nonGPL?
> 
> I hope that it is clear that v.in.dwg code __IS__ under GPL!!!

Not precise enough, let me try to clarify:

GPL + extention allowing to link opendwg is not GNU GPL anymore.

Still you are correct that it is Free Software under a license
close to the GNU GPL. It needs to link non-free software to operate though.
So on a complete Free Software operating system 
(e.g. official Debian GNU/Linux ("official" means non-free)) 
it cannot work.

> The problem IS NOT in 'Open DWG' license, the problem is in GRASS license.
> OpenDWG license allows without any fees: "You may incorporate the 
> OpenDWG libraries into programs that are used within your organization or school, 
> or are distributed for free to the general public via the Worldwide Web."
> (Please read http://www.opendwg.org/membership/join.htm)

The problem indeed is within the opendwg license,
because it is proprietory software!
It might be closer to Free Software then other proprietary
software, but this still is not enough.

> What is not possible is to distribute binaries, 
> because GPL used for GRASS doesn't allow it.

Which is good, because it protect the long term freedom of GRASS.
Relicensing GRASS to GNU LGPL is an possibility solve that legal problem,
but not from the stratecial point of view.

I quote more from OpenDWG:
	You may not, however,  distribute these programs in any
	commercial fashion, or in conjunction with any other commercial
	software applications.

To be precise GRASS is a commercial Free Software software application.
They mean something slightly different.

> Open DWG license gives more freedom to distribute v.in.dwg for free than GPL.

This is the general argument that non-free software can 
deliver more freedom that Free Software.
This argument is known for over a century and 
a majority of people dealing with Free Software licenses
(e.g. Software in the Public Interest, 
Open Source Initiative, Free Software Foundation)
found that the definition of Free Software is just giving more freedom.

> Put it to src.nonGPL is very confusing!!! 

Yes this is true.
As explained above v.in.dwg is Free Software,
but it needs non-free software to run.
Debian puts this software in the "contrib" directory,
because it never can be part of the official Debian GNU/Linux,
needing packages from "non-free".

NonGPL also is confusion because I never demanded that an dxf
library would be needed to be under GNU GPL. 
It needs to be Free Software under a GNU GPL compatible license.
An X11 style license would be perfectly reasonable if you 
want to allow the including to proprietory software.
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