[License-discuss] Is what's made with Open Source, Open Source?

[Gervase Markham]

On 11/06/15 20:53, Gareth Edwards wrote:
> Over on my Reddit post (http://redd.it/39gpcy) there's a reply that as
> Rapid is a server platform it doesn't get distributed like a typical
> desktop application so GPLv3 doesn't apply, and AGPLv3 should be used
> instead.

Well, it depends what you want to accomplish :-)

But even if you use GPLv3, if various e.g. Javascript support files
which are part of Rapid are needed for the app and are sent along with
it, that suggests to me that the app comes under the GPLv3.

> The Open Office document is a good example: I write an essay in Open
> Office and is the essay Open Source? Of course not, the words in the
> text are all my own. However the font is not, and, erm, neither are the
> other "building blocks" which Open Office is using to show me my essay.

But the font is not part of the file, unless it's embedded (which is not
the default). And that's why GPL font licenses have an exception for
embedding. Google "GPL font exception".

If a font was embedded, and was GPLed without the exception, and you
gave the file to someone else, that person would have a right to
redistribute and modify the file -- i.e. your essay -- under the GPL.

> And this is where Rapid apps get tricky. The debate (I think) is can a
> Rapid app exist, like my essay, independently of the Rapid platform used
> to make it? 

Well actually, again if you are using the GPL v3, the debate is "is a
Rapid app a "work based on the Program (i.e. Rapid)"? If it is, it's
GPLed, according to the GPL.

Gerv