[Qgis-psc] Proposal that QGIS.ORG will become a member of the OpenDesign Alliance

Wed Dec 16 01:58:31 PST 2015

Hi Vincent,

We are aware that you cannot mix/link QGIS/OGR/Teigha. For that reason 
Jürgen proposed to write a separate application published under a 
non-GPL based license (kind of a local server) that provides the CAD 
data. QGIS would not link to Teigha directly, but this other application 
would. QGIS would then connect to this service to get access to the CAD 
data.

This should work - otherwise you wouldn't be allowed to connect to OWS 
services that are not provided by a GPL-based OWS server software - 
which as far as I know is no problem.

Andreas

On 16.12.2015 10:42, Vincent Picavet (ml) wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Just a note on licencing.
>
> On 15/12/2015 21:56, Andreas Neumann wrote:
>> Vincent et all.
>>
>> Here is another issue I found out while doing research on LibreDWG. It
>> is not so much a funding issue, but more a GPL v2 vs. v3 incompatibility
>> issue.
>>
>> Apparently you are not allowed to mix GPLv2 and v3. LibreDWG is v3. Most
>> other graphics software is v2.
>>
>> For that reason, OpenSource CAD or graphics projects like FreeCAD,
>> LibreCAD, Inkscape, Blender, etc. are not allowed to use LibreDWG.
>>
>> Not so  sure about the situation of QGIS. QGIS states it is GPLv2 or
>> above. What does it mean? Is it v2 or v3 or both?
> It is both, according to how you link it to other software.
> Which means that you can link QGIS to LibreDWG, and the resulting
> distributed software will be GPLv3. This is not a problem.
>
> What is not allowed is to mix strict GPLv2 and GPLv3.
>
> As for implementing Teigha in OGR, this does not solve the problem, and
> is actually a kind of grey area. But in theory this is the way it works:
>
> GDAL/OGR is MIT Style
> Teigha is proprietary
> QGIS is GPLv2+
>
> You can link OGR with Teigha without problem, and distribute binaries
> if you have a Teigha licence.
> If you link GDAL/OGR with QGIS and distribute it, the resulting binaries
> are subject to the "share-alike" clause of the GPL. This is not a
> problem as GDAL/OGR is MIT style.
> If you link QGIS with an OGR version that is itself linked with Teigha,
> you have a problem : transitivity of the GPL "share-alike" licence. I do
> not think you are allowed to do that.
> I will double check with an Opensource-IP lawyer and tell the result,
> but I really doubt this is possible. This would be a too easy trick to
> avoid share-alike effects ( I could create a MIT-licenced proxy library
> around each proprietary library I want to link with GPL code).
>
> My 2 cents as far as licence is concerned,
>
> Vincent
>
>> See
>> http://libregraphicsworld.org/blog/entry/libredwg-drama-the-end-or-the-new-beginning
>>
>>
>> Seems like Richard Stallman personally stated that he is not going to
>> solve this GPL licensing compatibility issue. Apparently, LibreDWG was
>> forked by the project LibDWG, which is now developed under GPL v2 - but
>> also not very mature and stable. Last commit from March 2015.
>>
>> Anyway - I feel very uncomfortable building on an unfinished and not
>> very actively developed library that no other project really uses in a
>> professional project.
>>
>> Andreas
>>
>> On 15.12.2015 20:00, Vincent Picavet (ml) wrote:
>>> Hello,
>>>
>>> On 15/12/2015 15:37, Andreas Neumann wrote:
>>>> Hi QGIS.ORG board,
>>>>
>>>> As you may be aware, Jürgen I worked on a proposal to allow import of
>>>> CAD data into QGIS. Jürgen provided an offer.
>>>>
>>>> We plan to use the Teigha library of the OpenDesign Alliance (ODA)
>>>> (https://www.opendesign.com/the_oda_platform/Teigha). It isn't GPL
>>>> compatible and it requires a membership fee with annual renewal.
>>>>
>>>> I was investigating whether OSGEO could become a member - this is
>>>> theoretically possible, but it would require a higher and more expensive
>>>> membership level than as if QGIS.ORG would become a member. I would thus
>>>> propose that QGIS.ORG becomes a sustaining member of the ODA, which
>>>> would allow to distribute binaries of the Teigha library for all of our
>>>> supported platforms, along with the QGIS binaries.
>>>>
>>>> Financially, the sustaining membership level would mean US $5000.- in
>>>> the first year and US $3000.- annual renewal in the subsequent years. I
>>>> would propose that QGIS.ORG would pay this membership fees from the
>>>> QGIS.ORG funds - and if you agree - will include it into our 2016
>>>> budget. See https://www.opendesign.com/Sustaining
>>> I am really wondering where we are going to right now with QGIS.Org.
>>>
>>> I already gave my opinion that the organization should not spend money
>>> to fund features. This is just an opinion, and I do respect that some
>>> would not agree. It would at least need a debate first though.
>>>
>>> But this yet is another story. Funding directly some proprietary
>>> software vendors ? Yearly ? Really ?
>>>
>>> I have no problem with QGIS plugins using some prorietary piece of code,
>>> circumventing the GPL. But this proposal is a different beast :
>>> * It is feature-related funding, for a quite large amount ( that's ok if
>>> it is not qgis.org paying, but this should be clear)
>>> * It would fund a proprietary software vendor ( definitly not ok)
>>> * It would package proprietary software with default QGIS releases ( not
>>> ok )
>>> * It would implement a technical (ugly) workaround for licence
>>> compatibility ( not ok in core or default installed plugin )
>>> * It is a recurrent spending, with a very difficult way back ( removing
>>> the user such a feature will be hard)
>>>
>>> Why don't you implement a separate proprietary tool with a end-user
>>> installer, having nothing to do with QGIS.org, OSGeo, nor QGIS
>>> distribution, that allows format conversion to QGIS project/data/style
>>> files ?
>>> We would not have to mess with proprietary software, and any
>>> non-opensource organization could pay the money to be allowed to
>>> distribute it. Even a simple end user could distribute this separate
>>> tool, paying the licence fee.
>>> But please, do not involve QGIS.org in this mess, we have plenty enough
>>> with the ECW opensource-not-libre dragon.
>>>
>>> Or follow strk's advice and improve the libredwg library. That's the
>>> right way to do things.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>> Vincent
>>>
>>> PS : Jeff will probably not answer your queries as he resigned from
>>> OSGeo's board
>>>
>>>> I will propose to make this decision dependent on our ability to raise
>>>> the 32k Euros required to pay Jürgen for the QGIS-side development. So
>>>> far I only have confirmations for about 10k Euros. Still some work to
>>>> raise the full amount.
>>>>
>>>> Do you have any questions regarding this proposal?
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Andreas
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