[License-review] Sublicensing

[Jim Wright]

Perhaps so.  I'm just not sure the use of the word permissions without the word restrictions means you don't need to distribute the whole under the GPL, since the same sentence clearly states that distribution of "the whole must be on the terms of this License."   (A sentiment which is duplicated in part 2(b), saying "You must cause any work … that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program … to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.")  Reading "the whole" as really meaning only the original GPLed work, not actually the whole of the code, after you insert some code otherwise licensed under a permissive license, seems inconsistent with the clear intent to me, and makes me wonder if one, under the suggested interpretation, could also author and license modifications arbitrary modifications to GPL code under the BSD (which again, seems contrary to the intent).  The words "terms of this License" are not at all the same as "having at least the same permissions as this License" IMHO.

Of course reasonable people may differ about such things (or perhaps I'm unreasonable ;-) and we'll have to wait for n judges to give us n+m interpretations someday, but in any event, for the purpose of the UPL, the discussion is totally academic.   The fact that we're even having these conversations on the subject (about this, about whether the BSD permits sublicensing, etc.), which have been ongoing for years, is what leads me to clearly provide that under the UPL, you *can* sublicense, including on other terms, whether commercial, copyleft, or otherwise.

 Best,
  Jim


On Sep 12, 2014, at 12:54 PM, John Cowan <cowan at mercury.ccil.org> wrote:

> Jim Wright scripsit:
> 
>> Well, it seems to me to be what allows the mechanics of copyleft license
>> compatibility to work at a fundamental level - if I cannot sublicense
>> a copy of an MIT licensed header file to a subsequent recipient under
>> the GPLv2, I don't know how I can include that header file in a GPLv2
>> licensed c file and then distribute the compiled object file and
>> corresponding source, because the recipient of the combined module
>> needs to get "each and every part" under the GPLv2.
> 
> I'm pretty sure that's a misreading of the GPLv2.  The relevant sentence
> is:  "But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which
> is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on
> the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend
> to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who
> wrote it."
> 
> Note that it does not say "whose permissions and restrictions".  So this
> means that if part of the code is released under a license that grants
> at least the same permissions as the GPL, and does not impose further
> restrictions, the GPL is satisfied.
> 
> The implementation of the Pure programming language is packaged as
> a library issued under a permissive license which comes with two main
> programs.  Main-1 invokes routines from a GPLed third-party library, and
> therefore is itself under the GPL, as is any binary version built from it.
> Main-2 does not invoke such routines and so has less function than Main-1,
> but it is under the permissive license, so it can be reused in non-GPLed
> programs.  The author originally wrote only Main-1, and I and others
> persuaded him to make the changes to produce Main-2 and package both.
> We couldn't do it because of the GPL, but the author is of course not
> bound by his own license.
> 
> -- 
> John Cowan          http://www.ccil.org/~cowan        cowan at ccil.org
> My confusion is rapidly waxing
> For XML Schema's too taxing:
> I'd use DTDs / If they had local trees --
> I think I best switch to RELAX NG.
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