tnt-devel

[tnt-devel] TNT license

[Ulrich M. <ul...@ge...>]

Hi,

I hope this list is still alive. I'm maintainer of Emacs related
packages in Gentoo. Recently it was pointed out to me that TNT is
released under a non-free license.

The following old thread (it's about TiK, but the TNT license has the
same terms) summarises the issue nicely:
<http://www.mail-archive.com/deb...@li.../msg04343.html>

| The TiK license looks a lot like the standard BSD / XFree86
| non-Copyleft Free Software license, except for two minor issues.
| First, clause ii) places a restriction on how the software can be
| used. Second, another section near the end makes some additional
| prohibitions on use by saying the software can not be used to
| operate a nuclear facility or for aircraft control, air traffic,
| aircraft navigation or aircraft communications. While this section
| is of little consequence to anyone because it is probably impossible
| for someone to use TiK for any of these purposes, this restriction
| violates our guideline #6 (No Discrimination Against Fields of
| Endeavor) and may prevent us from distributing the software.

Now TiK was relicensed under the GNU GPL long time ago. Therefore I'd
like to ask if the same could be done for TNT?

Also, the SF project page <http://sourceforge.net/projects/tnt/>
wrongly labels the package as "License: OSI-Approved Open Source".
At least that should be changed.

Ulrich

Re: [tnt-devel] TNT license

[Jim W. II <jnw...@gm...>]

On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 11:18 AM, Ulrich Mueller <ul...@ge...> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I hope this list is still alive. I'm maintainer of Emacs related
> packages in Gentoo. Recently it was pointed out to me that TNT is
> released under a non-free license.
>
> The following old thread (it's about TiK, but the TNT license has the
> same terms) summarises the issue nicely:
> <http://www.mail-archive.com/deb...@li.../msg04343.html>
>
> | The TiK license looks a lot like the standard BSD / XFree86
> | non-Copyleft Free Software license, except for two minor issues.
> | First, clause ii) places a restriction on how the software can be
> | used. Second, another section near the end makes some additional
> | prohibitions on use by saying the software can not be used to
> | operate a nuclear facility or for aircraft control, air traffic,
> | aircraft navigation or aircraft communications. While this section
> | is of little consequence to anyone because it is probably impossible
> | for someone to use TiK for any of these purposes, this restriction
> | violates our guideline #6 (No Discrimination Against Fields of
> | Endeavor) and may prevent us from distributing the software.
>
> Now TiK was relicensed under the GNU GPL long time ago. Therefore I'd
> like to ask if the same could be done for TNT?
>
> Also, the SF project page <http://sourceforge.net/projects/tnt/>
> wrongly labels the package as "License: OSI-Approved Open Source".
> At least that should be changed.

Unfortunately, the license isn't something that we are able to change.
 We didn't set the license, and the original code was released by AOL
and they retain the copyright for that original work.  We thus cannot
relicense their work without their explicit permission and we had
enough difficulty finding the code in the first place.

I've updated the sourceforge page to reflect 'Other license', per your
suggestion.

- Jim

Re: [tnt-devel] TNT license

[NeilFred P. <nei...@gm...>]

Of all the developers who have contributed to TNT since the
SourceForge project was created, I suspect that nobody would have any
problem at all with changing the license to be more free.  The license
text that's in there is probably just whatever AOL put in when they
originally released the initial version of the code; I don't think
anyone has bothered to change it.

How did the TiK developers go about changing their license?  Did they
actually get any kind of approval to do so from AOL or did they just
change it assuming that AOL would never bother to come after them?

-- 
NeilFred Picciotto



On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 3:18 AM, Ulrich Mueller <ul...@ge...> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I hope this list is still alive. I'm maintainer of Emacs related
> packages in Gentoo. Recently it was pointed out to me that TNT is
> released under a non-free license.
>
> The following old thread (it's about TiK, but the TNT license has the
> same terms) summarises the issue nicely:
> <http://www.mail-archive.com/deb...@li.../msg04343.html>
>
> | The TiK license looks a lot like the standard BSD / XFree86
> | non-Copyleft Free Software license, except for two minor issues.
> | First, clause ii) places a restriction on how the software can be
> | used. Second, another section near the end makes some additional
> | prohibitions on use by saying the software can not be used to
> | operate a nuclear facility or for aircraft control, air traffic,
> | aircraft navigation or aircraft communications. While this section
> | is of little consequence to anyone because it is probably impossible
> | for someone to use TiK for any of these purposes, this restriction
> | violates our guideline #6 (No Discrimination Against Fields of
> | Endeavor) and may prevent us from distributing the software.
>
> Now TiK was relicensed under the GNU GPL long time ago. Therefore I'd
> like to ask if the same could be done for TNT?
>
> Also, the SF project page <http://sourceforge.net/projects/tnt/>
> wrongly labels the package as "License: OSI-Approved Open Source".
> At least that should be changed.
>
> Ulrich
>
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Re: [tnt-devel] TNT license

[Jim W. II <jnw...@gm...>]

On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 8:00 PM, NeilFred Picciotto <nei...@gm...> wrote:
> Of all the developers who have contributed to TNT since the
> SourceForge project was created, I suspect that nobody would have any
> problem at all with changing the license to be more free.  The license
> text that's in there is probably just whatever AOL put in when they
> originally released the initial version of the code; I don't think
> anyone has bothered to change it.

Indeed, but that's really my point.  The codebase we contributed to
already began with a license and we can't just override that without
some actually standing to do so.

> How did the TiK developers go about changing their license?  Did they
> actually get any kind of approval to do so from AOL or did they just
> change it assuming that AOL would never bother to come after them?

It would be interested to hear how they handled the situation, we
might be able to just follow suit.

- Jim

Re: [tnt-devel] TNT license

[NeilFred P. <nei...@gm...>]

On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 3:24 PM, Jim Whitehead II <jnw...@gm...> wrote:
> On Fri, Feb 19, 2010 at 8:00 PM, NeilFred Picciotto <nei...@gm...> wrote:
>> Of all the developers who have contributed to TNT since the
>> SourceForge project was created, I suspect that nobody would have any
>> problem at all with changing the license to be more free.  The license
>> text that's in there is probably just whatever AOL put in when they
>> originally released the initial version of the code; I don't think
>> anyone has bothered to change it.
>
> Indeed, but that's really my point.  The codebase we contributed to
> already began with a license and we can't just override that without
> some actually standing to do so.

Right, exactly my point as well.  :)  Hence my question about how TiK did it.

>> How did the TiK developers go about changing their license?  Did they
>> actually get any kind of approval to do so from AOL or did they just
>> change it assuming that AOL would never bother to come after them?
>
> It would be interested to hear how they handled the situation, we
> might be able to just follow suit.

The thread that Ulrich linked to --

http://www.mail-archive.com/deb...@li.../msg04343.html

includes messages (labeled as coming from "tictoc") which kind of
sound like they may have come from someone actually at AOL...?  Of
course that was over 10 years ago, so even if we could get hold of the
email address that message came from, they probably no longer work for
AOL.  :)

-- 
NeilFred Picciotto

Re: [tnt-devel] TNT license

[Ulrich M. <ul...@ge...>]

>>>>> On Fri, 19 Feb 2010, NeilFred Picciotto wrote:

>>> How did the TiK developers go about changing their license? Did
>>> they actually get any kind of approval to do so from AOL or did
>>> they just change it assuming that AOL would never bother to come
>>> after them?
>> 
>> It would be interested to hear how they handled the situation, we
>> might be able to just follow suit.

> The thread that Ulrich linked to --

> http://www.mail-archive.com/deb...@li.../msg04343.html

> includes messages (labeled as coming from "tictoc") which kind of
> sound like they may have come from someone actually at AOL...?

That thread (including all e-mail addresses) is also archived here:

<http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/1999/03/msg00200.html>

Ulrich