Re: [Htmlparser-developer] HTMLParser License requirements in a commercial app

[Somik R. <so...@ya...>]

Hi Richard,

> Could someone clarify the licensing situation / fulfilment requirements
> of HTMLParser with regard to its inclusion as part of an otherwise
> closed-source commercial app.

Thanks for bringing up this question. The parser is licensed under LGPL.
This means, applications that USE it dont have to be open-source. But, here
are two restrictions that apply:
[1] Any modifications made to the library itself must be kept open-source or
made available.
[2] Your app source code does not live with the parser source code, but the
object code does. That means - people should either be able to reverse
engineer your product so as to be able to remove the parser library and put
a newer version in (gasp!) or - simply provide an external linkage to the
parser - whereby folks can swap out the current version with a later version
(the idea is to let them have the benefit of the open-source library). That
reverse engineering stuff is actually a cryptic interpretation of the
clause - applicable only if you want to provide a single executable in your
application (it can be bypassed, but I dont want to further complicate the
interpretation for you - let me know if this is the case and I can advise
you accordingly).

Bytway, if you are not distributing your application, and only using it
internally, none of the above applies. Let me know if that answers your
question.

Regards,
Somik
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  Somik Raha
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