Eiffel Forum License

[Patrick Doyle]

I received these comments from Roger Browne from the Eiffel Forum.  I
believe he has now subscribed to this list too.

--
Patrick Doyle
doylep at ecf.toronto.edu


---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 28 Apr 2000 22:17:13 +0100
From: Roger Browne <roger at eiffel.demon.co.uk>
To: Patrick Doyle <doylep at ecf.utoronto.ca>
Subject: Re: Review: Eiffel Forum License (fwd)

> On Thu, 27 Apr 2000, Russell Nelson wrote:
> 
> The license refers to the "package" several times, but it does not
> specify that the package is source code.

The package need not be source code. The Eiffel Forum license could be
applied to binary software, just as the MIT license could be applied to
binary software. But I can't recall seeing the Eiffel Forum License ever
applied to anything other than source code.

> If I distribute a binary that *depends* on the package, I have to
> release the package modifications. However, it appears that I can
> distribute the binary of the modified package itself without releasing
> the changes. Is this intentional, or am I misreading this?

You are reading it correctly. It is not intentional (i.e. we did not
seek to word the license to permit it) but it is acceptable.

Open Source Licensing is about permitting source, not about prohibiting
binaries. Otherwise, the MIT license could never have been certified.

> What exactly does "without written agreement and without license" mean?

The phrase doesn't make sense when chopped off at that point. We intend
that this phrase:

   without written agreement and without license or royalty fees

is parsed like this:

   (without written agreement) and (without (license fees or royalty
fees))

This phrase is taken straight from the license that the University of
California applies to software such as Ptolemy and many other software
packages (see their license text at
http://www.ptolemy.eecs.berkeley.edu/copyright.htm)

The bit about "without written agreement" means you can use the software
without getting separate signed written permission (to satisfy managers
who think they need a piece of paper for every piece of software they
use).

The bit about "without license or royalty fees" just means that no money
needs to change hands.


By the way, I'd like to give a bit of background to this license. It
originated in the Eiffel software world, amongst authors of Eiffel
libraries who wished to facilitate the spread of Eiffel. But to be
successful in the small world of Eiffel, it was essential that the major
open source libraries were interoperable (preferably under the same
license) and that they were acceptable to commercial and non-commercial
users alike.

The GPL was judged to be potentially divisive. The LGPL would have
suited everyone, except that its wording is based on the C model of
compilation and linkage which is  inapplicable to Eiffel. The MIT/BSD
licenses suited most package authors, except for a few who felt that
they didn't yield enough community benefit if a commercial user enhanced
a package for their own purposes. So we included a requirement that
anyone releasing a binary depending on an enhanced version of the
package must release the enhanced version of the package - and we came
up with the Eiffel Forum License.

Since then, most new Eiffel libraries and applications have been
released under the Eiffel Forum License. As far as I can tell, it meets
all the Open Source guidelines (when applied to source code). 

Regards,
Roger
-- 
Roger Browne - roger at eiffel.tm - Everything Eiffel
19 Eden Park Lancaster LA1 4SJ UK - Phone +44 1524 32428