Re: [DoomBSP] License

[Colin P. <cp...@do...>]

I've checked through the source again, and there appear to be 2 
relevant licenses:

- "please credit me" applies to most files
- the code in makenode.c is at least partly derived from DEU 5.0, 
 and comments indicate this is under a "if you use this in your programs, 
 mention my name"

The former is vague, probably enough so that the GPL is sufficient 
to be considered to satisfy it. Although it's not clear. The latter 
definitely looks like a BSD+advertising clause type of license.

At the moment it appears that BSP's license is only compatible with the 
non-GPL ports; how ironic.

On Thu, Sep 21, 2000 at 02:47:05PM +0000, Andre Majorel wrote:
> Sure, but it's not because it's always been broken that it
> should not be fixed.

Point taken.

> > - the non-GPL Doom ports want to include bits of BSP, or contribute bits 
> >  to it.
> 
> I think these are illegal anyway. Wasn't there an argument
> recently between Carmack and the author of csDoom ?

I must've missed Carmack stepping in; I know that several of the GPL port 
authors tried and failed reasoning with him, myself included. Carmack's 
view is neatly summed up by http://csdoom.sourceforge.net/carmack.txt
I think a fair summary is that they're legal for educational use, 
provided you trust Raven not to sue you for the hexen bits.

Anyway I don't care about the non-GPL ports enough to go out of my 
way to accomodate them. If the current license is not GPL compatible, 
I'll certainly go for a BSD+advertising style license. If it can be GPL'd, 
I will probably do so, because GPL is the main license for Doom stuff these 
days.

<joke>
Looks like time to talk to some GPL experts... hey let's ask slashdot!
</joke>

Colin