[License-discuss] OSI equivalent

[Tzeng, Nigel H.]

Because there is often a compatibility discussion with new license submissions and because the confusion among developers regarding OSS license compatibility comes up about once a year.

For example in 2013 it was brought up in the discussion on NOSA 2.0

https://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review/2013-June/001948.html

And a major objective of EUPL 1.2 was for increased interoperability between EUPL and other licenses

https://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review/2013-March/001874.html

And more recently for LiLiQ there was discussion on its' compatibility with CDDl and MPL

https://lists.opensource.org/pipermail/license-review/2015-October/002586.html

And I brought up compatibility between the recently proposed ESA licenses and NOSA.

And incompatibility is mentioned as part of the proliferation project:


  1.  ...
  2.  some licenses do not play well together
Some people use "license proliferation" to refer to the fact that some open source licenses do not inter-operate well with other open source licenses. While we can urge people not to mix non-mixable licenses, we cannot keep people from doing so. This comment generally came from larger companies.

https://opensource.org/proliferation

https://opensource.org/proliferation-report

In what way is license interoperability/compatibility ONLY a FSF issue and not also an OSI one?

From: Richard Fontana <fontana at sharpeleven.org<mailto:fontana at sharpeleven.org>>
Date: Wednesday, Feb 15, 2017, 5:56 PM
To: license-discuss at opensource.org <license-discuss at opensource.org<mailto:license-discuss at opensource.org>>
Subject: Re: [License-discuss] OSI equivalent

License compatibility is mostly an FSF-made and GPL-specific
doctrine. I can't see how it would make any sense for the OSI to
provide guidance on license compatibility beyond acknowledging (as the
OSI occasionally has done) the FSF's authority on the topic.




On Wed, Feb 15, 2017 at 10:46:39PM +0000, Tzeng, Nigel H. wrote:
> So what is the point of the OSI if it cannot do a simple up or down vote on a license submission from NASA after 3 years or provide any compatibility guidance on the licenses it managed to approve in the distant past?
>
> Especially if the FSF has no problems in providing such guidance?
>
> From: David Woolley <forums at david-woolley.me.uk<mailto:forums at david-woolley.me.uk>>
> Date: Wednesday, Feb 15, 2017, 4:17 PM
> To: license-discuss at opensource.org <license-discuss at opensource.org<mailto:license-discuss at opensource.org>>
> Subject: Re: [License-discuss] OSI equivalent
>
> On 15/02/17 16:58, Karan, Cem F CIV USARMY RDECOM ARL (US) wrote:
> > Does OSI have a license compatibility chart for the various approved licenses?
>
> I would have thought that any such document would constitute legal
> advice, which is illegal for half the list members to provide, and the
> other half would only provide in the context of their specific client's
> circumstances.
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