Hello everybody,
before I subject you to your dose of "What's new on the Freecell Solver
trunk", I'd like to discuss its licensing. As you may know, the Freecell
Solver COPYING file has read up to now:
{{{{{{{{{{{{
Relax, this is not GPL software, but rather it is distributed under the
public domain. It means it can be linked against anything, converted to
any different license, freely used and distributed, and anything else
without any restrictions whatsoever. No Strings Attached!<tm>
Well, enjoy!
Shlomi Fish
}}}}}}}}}}}}
Similarly the comment at the beginning of most files reads:
{{{{{{{{{{{{
/*
* scans.c - The code that relates to the various scans.
* Currently Hard DFS, Soft-DFS, Random-DFS, A* and BFS are implemented.
*
* Written by Shlomi Fish (
http://www.shlomifish.org/ ), 2000-2001
*
* This file is in the public domain (it's uncopyrighted).
*/
}}}}}}}}}}}}
So far this has seemed to work pretty well for Freecell Solver. However,
placing code under the Public Domain results in some potential legal problems:
*
http://linuxmafia.com/faq/Licensing_and_Law/public-domain.html
*
http://www.builderau.com.au/blogs/syslog/viewblogpost.htm?p=339270930
*
http://use.perl.org/comments.pl?sid=39148&cid=62005
As a result I now think I should "convert" the licensing terms of new Freecell
Solver releases to the MIT/X11 Licence:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIT_License
I say "convert" in quotes because as far as all parties involved are
concerned, what you can do with the code (i.e: almost anything) is not going
to change.
The X11L is arguably the most reasonably-liberal licence out there, possibly
except for
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WTFPL , which is more of a joke.
But I'm asking you if you have any objection to this change. Say "+1" if you
approve or don't mind, or "-1" if you're opposed (and then explain why).
Regards,
Shlomi Fish
--
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Shlomi Fish http://www.shlomifish.org/
http://www.shlomifish.org/humour/ways_to_do_it.html
God gave us two eyes and ten fingers so we will type five times as much as we
read.
Received on Thu Mar 19 2009 - 01:03:02 IST