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By: Zeno R.R. Davatz
 RE: GPL v3! [ reply ]
2009-01-01 01:04
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Dear Larry
Thank you for your wishes. I wish you a happy and successful 2009 as well.
Please read: http://www.linux.com/articles/61130
Torvalds would indeed very much consider using the GPLv3 in a new project. What really matters is that the project would be new.
I still believe that GEM is primarily something technical but of course you can discuss what you want where you want and we can price what we want for Spreadsheet for commercial use.
If you are a real and solid Techie, why not stop discussing political and business stuff and start contributing some code - right here?
Of course, feel free to contribute business Know-How to ywesee as well but then I recommend doing that on http://spreadsheet.ch
Best
Zeno
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By: Larry Kluger
RE: GPL v3! [ reply ]
2008-12-31 23:45
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Hello Zeno and Hannes,
Thank you for your posts. Several comments:
This is the perfect forum for discussing this issue since it concerns all Ruby developers who are interested in using this Gem.
I am a developer and actively contribute software, documentation and time to open software projects. -- That use permissive licenses.
If you want to charge for commercial use of your spreadsheet library, that's your prerogative. I note however that you made use of the permissive licenses of Open Office for their documentation of the Excel data formats. So you didn't exactly start from zero. It was the Open Office folks and John McNamara, the Perl spreadsheet author, who started from zero. They were the ones who had to sweat through the Microsoft obtuse documentation.
I'll also point out that you have some competition since the Perl spreadsheet library is permissively licensed and can be ported to Ruby without too much effort. -- And already was once.
Re commercial licensing for a fee: I think that can be reasonable depending on the fee and terms. Your current terms on your web site are not usual: if someone is paying a fee then there should be a "License Grant" section that says something like "Perpetual, non-exclusive, royalty-free license is granted except for sub-licensing to others."
I note that you do not have a price on your web site. That would be another important issue.
With respect to your comment that "For a new project it does make sense to start with a GPLv3 Licence. Even Linus Torvalds would consider doing that." I think your statement is 100% wrong. Linus is 100% against GPLv3, read any of the many postings about that. And new projects are started all the time with permissive licenses. Eg see Rails, started from nothing a couple of years ago.
I wish you good success in your company.
Personally, my plan is to use the perl spreadsheet library as an output filter within my ruby sw.
Happy New Year,
Larry
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By: Zeno R.R. Davatz
RE: GPL v3! [ reply ]
2008-12-16 13:24
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Dear Larry
Let me introduce myself. I am Zeno, the business partner of Hannes. Together we run ywesee GmbH.
I totally understand that you are disgruntled. At the same time I would like to note the following points:
1. For a new project it does make sense to start with a GPLv3 Licence. Even Linus Torvalds would consider doing that. Spreadsheet is a totally new project started from 0.
2. The projects you mentioned are big, existing projects, many years old. That is a different cup of tea. Big existing projects like OpenOffice or the Kernel have more strings attached and therefore should be treated differently.
3. Why don't we move the legal and commercial discussion over to http://www.spreadsheet.ch - you can post your comments and rants there.
4. Lets leave this spot to the developers who actually do the coding.
Best
Zeno
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By: Hannes Wyss
RE: GPL v3! [ reply ]
2008-12-16 12:46
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Larry,
Ok, I'll bite - what would be the advantage for the community in releasing Spreadsheet under a more permissive License?
That asked - here's what I want: Everybody should be be able to use Spreadsheet, provided they are ready to give /something/ back to society. That is a very open requirement - and as such not easy to put into a legal document like a Software-License. I'm happy to let you use Spreadsheet if you are planning to contribute a library of your own to the Open Source Software universe - or have already done so; or if you need it to manage your organisation's food-parcels to the working-poor in your neighbourhood; or if it may help you find the solution to the world's energy-crisis. But what license to use for this vector of intentions? I've no idea.
Which is why I've decided to release Spreadsheet under the GPL v3, and grant exceptions based on individual requests. IANAL, but I believe that should work just fine, at least as long as I am the only major contributor to the code-base of Spreadsheet >= 0.6.0.
If that still doesn't work for you, you may purchase a commercial License (see http://rubyspreadsheet.wordpress.com/2008/12/11/ruby-spreadsheet-licence-for-companies-that-do-not-want-to-use-gplv3/) - and as far as I'm concerned that means you're giving to the community by supporting the development of Spreadsheet.
Of course there's always the option of using ParseExcel/Spreadsheet::Excel which both remain available under more permissive licenses.
hth
cheers
Hannes
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By: Larry Kluger
RE: GPL v3! [ reply ]
2008-12-16 05:39
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In case anyone is wondering what I'm disgruntled about--the GPL v3 requires that any program linked to a GPL library (eg this spreadsheet library), must make his or her software source available to anyone via a compatible license.
That means that ANY Ruby or Rails program which uses spreadsheet MUST have have publicly available source.
Larry
ps. See
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#IfLibraryIsGPL
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By: Larry Kluger
GPL v3! [ reply ]
2008-12-16 05:26
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I'm surprised and disappointed that you chose the GPL v3 instead of a permissive license.
I note that the spreadsheet-excel project used the Ruby license. So does OpenOffice.
Feh.
Larry
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