[Qgis-developer] import proprietary code inside a python plugin

[Nathan Woodrow]

I already tried the LGPL thing a while back [0] :)

[0] http://www.osgeo.org/pipermail/qgis-developer/2011-November/016741.html

- Nathan

On Mon, Mar 26, 2012 at 9:02 PM, Vincent Picavet <vincent.ml at oslandia.com>wrote:

> Hi Giovanni,
>
> Le lundi 26 mars 2012 12:45:39, G. Allegri a écrit :
> > I had to create a python plugin to obatin some interactions with the ESRI
> > ArcGIS Geoprocessing python framework. To do that, I need to import
> ESRI's
> > libraries in my plugin, which are clearly not GLP'd :)
> > Following a previous thread on this topic, I wonder if it's legal from
> the
> > side of QGis (obviously it is ok from the ArcGIS's side having a licence
> > for it).
>
> From my point of view, after researches about this specific issue, you
> can't
> legally :
>
> http://gis.stackexchange.com/questions/19646/issues-with-osgeo-qgis-core-and-
> arcpy-modules/19661#19661
>
> GPL is a copyleft licence, therefore «contamining» other libraries. All
> software piece which is linked to a GPL library must have a licence
> compatible
> with GPL.
> An python «import» is considered as a link.
>
> I would advise you to change your software to adopt a loose coupling
> strategy
> between the qgis part and the esri part, either through web services, data
> exchange over a file or a database or something else not considered as a
> link
> in the GPL sense.
>
> I personnaly consider that libraries should not be under a GPL licence but
> a
> LGPL one, which keeps the opensource aspect while facilitating mixing with
> other softwares. GPL is fine with end user software built on top of LGPL
> libs.
> That said, it would require to relicence all qgis source code as LGPL with
> all
> contributors agreeing to the change.
> And this is only my personal view, I do not want to start a licence troll
> thread.
>
> Vincent
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