Help in choosing appropriate open-source license...

[John Cowan]

Ernest Prabhakar scripsit:

> The only well-known license I know of that has "app server"  
> restrictions is the Affero license:
> 
> http://www.affero.org/oagpl.html
> 
> But, I don't remember if that was Open Source or not.  Anything  
> stronger than that would probably not be.

It is not OSI certified, but there is no obvious reason for it not to
be an open-source license: in fact, it is simply the GNU GPL v2 with an
additional paragraph:

	* d) If the Program as you received it is intended to interact
	with users through a computer network[,]

	and if, in the version you received, any user interacting with
	the Program was given the opportunity to request transmission
	to that user of the Program's complete source code,

	[then] you must not remove that facility from your modified
	version of the Program or work based on the Program,

	and [you] must offer an equivalent opportunity for all users
	interacting with your Program through a computer network to
	request immediate transmission by HTTP of the complete source
	code of your modified version or other derivative work.

(Slightly reformatted for improved readability.)

Note that this is weaker than just "ASP use is distribution"; if the
program has a facility to grab source, your version must have that facility too.

The Open Source License does treat ASP use as deployment.

-- 
John Cowan  cowan at ccil.org  www.ap.org  www.ccil.org/~cowan
   There was an old man                Said with a laugh, "I
     From Peru, whose lim'ricks all      Cut them in half, the pay is
       Look'd like haiku.  He              Much better for two."
                                             --Emmet O'Brien