FW: NASM - Don't hate me.

[Nelson Rush]

-----Original Message-----
From: Simon Tatham [mailto:simon at ixion.tartarus.org]On Behalf Of Simon
Tatham
Sent: Tuesday, September 05, 2000 9:42 AM
To: palisade at users.sourceforge.net
Subject: Re: NASM - Don't hate me.


"Nelson Rush" <chesterrr at att.net> wrote:

> You're a hard man to get in contact with.

In what way? I've been at <anakin at pobox.com> ever since 1997, and
I've _always_ responded to email sent there. My home page is the
first thing that comes up if you type my name into Google. I've
never tried to be hard to get in contact with.

Did you once send me some email which bounced? How have you tried to
get in contact with me that didn't work?

> So, the license implicates that we can simply drop the NASM license
> and choose the GPL?? That's not how I read it, I mean I can
> understand if that's how it was intended but intention and reality
> are two different things sometimes.

Yes, that's how the licence was intended. If it failed to come out
that way, then I'm willing to do everything I can to help it be
_made_ to come out that way. If you, or somebody, proposes an
alternative licence then I'll agree to let my bits of NASM be
distributed under it.

> Here's the two parts that seem funny to me:
>
> "II. The Software, or parts thereof, may be incorporated into other freely
> redistributable software (by which we mean software that may be obtained
> free of charge) without requiring permission from the authors, as long as
> due credit is given to the authors of the Software in the resulting work,
as
> long as the authors are informed of this action if possible, and as long
as
> those parts of the Software that are used remain under this licence."
>
> "X. In addition to what this Licence otherwise provides, the Software may
be
> distributed in such a way as to be compliant with the GNU General Public
> Licence, as published by the Free Software Foundation, Cambridge, MA, USA;
> version 2, or, at your option, any later version; incorporated herein by
> reference. You must include a copy of this Licence with such distribution.
> Furthermore, patches sent to the authors for the purpose of inclusion in
the
> official release version are considered cleared for release under the full
> terms of this Licence."

The intent of that was to say (in English, not offered as
replacement licence text):

  II. If you accept the non-GPL branch of the NASM licence, you may
  incorporate NASM into free programs under <these> conditions.

  X. If you don't like the non-GPL branch of the NASM licence, you
  may accept the GPL and use NASM under that instead.

With hindsight, perhaps we should have done what I thought about
doing at the time: instead of adding the GPL clause to the original
licence, we should have left the original licence as it is, and
created a _new_ `dual' licence, which would have been very short and
would have read something like

  I. You may accept the NASM Original Licence and use NASM within
  the provisions of that.

  II. Alternatively, you may accept the GPL and use NASM within the
  provisions of that.

  III. If you accept neither of these, you have no right to
  redistribute NASM at all.

That would have made things much clearer, I think.

Oh, and I don't hate you. I can see that you were just trying to get
something useful done ... I just wish there'd been some way you
could have got it done _without_ me getting into work this morning,
looking over Slashdot, and finding one of my babies under fire.

Cheers,
Simon
--
Simon Tatham         "You may call that a cheap shot.
<anakin at pobox.com>    I prefer to think of it as good value."