MapServer and AGG licences

[Paul Ramsey]

The main branch of Mapserver doesn't not have to be re-licensed in  
order for Mapserver to be distributed under the GPL. I can take a  
copy of SVN right now, and set up a new Mapserver-GPL project, for  
all us FSF zealots to contribute to.  That won't change the licensing  
of the main Mapserver branch, but it will make Mapserver available  
under the GPL.  Clear as mud?

The only people that would be affected by Mapserver+AGG2.5 GPL would  
be folks currently distributing binary-only, ALTERED versions of  
Mapserver, who want to keep their alterations proprietary and  
closed.  And then only if they insisted on distributing binary-only,  
altered versions of Mapserver+AGG2.5!  Not many of those folks,  
methinks?  MapDotNet Server? Anyone else?

Anyhow, the whole thing wrapped up on -DEV, with a note that the AGG  
2.4 version seems to be working just fine, and there's no need to use  
the 2.5 version at all right now.  So it is a hypothetical situation  
right now.  But a great discussion for the pub, if you have a pad of  
paper and pen to diagram out all the details!

P

On 24-Oct-07, at 10:23 AM, Julien-Samuel Lacroix wrote:

> There was a very informative discussion on the MapServer-Dev  
> mailing-list about a MapServer vs AGG 2.5 licence compatibility. In  
> short I think it reads like the following. Note that AGG 2.4 has no  
> licence issue with MapServer since it was a BSD licence.
>
>> "For AGG, you'll be linking to a GPL library, which means you  
>> won't be
>> able to distribute BSD binaries anymore -- any binary linked against
>> AGG will have to go out under the GPL. Basically, if you only care
>> about Mapserver as an open source product, it's no problem, but if
>> you have any plans to distribute altered versions as closed source,
>> you cannot do it with the AGG dependency turned on."
>
> and
>
>> If one distributes MapServer linked with a GPL AGG I *think* you are
>> required to provide MapServer under GPL terms.  Because there is no
>> one contributor who has rights to alter MapServer licensing terms I
>> believe the distributor would be in violation of the AGG GPL terms.
>
> See:
> http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0710&L=mapserver- 
> dev&D=1&T=0&O=D&X=4DEC7415D8C7791480&P=12919
>
> Julien
> PS: There was no discussion of re-licencing MapServer.
>
> -- 
> Julien-Samuel Lacroix
> Mapgears
> http://www.mapgears.com/