[darcs-users] how to redistribute darcs+Eclipse (was: Darcs API?)

Jamie Webb j at jmawebb.cjb.net
Sat Jun 4 09:40:52 UTC 2005


On Fri, Jun 03, 2005 at 10:47:18AM -0300, zooko at zooko.com wrote:
> The reason I care about it in *general* is that there someday may be an
> opportunity to create a useful tool that by combining darcs and CPL'ed code
> someday, and by that time it may be too late to relicense darcs.

But... why single out the CPL in this way? What about the MPL? Apache
license? Those are more popular than the CPL, and also
GPL-incompatible.

Personally, I hope that the FSF releases a GPLv3 that sorts out these
minor incompatibilites, since they all appear to be for similar
reasons (and, in response to the discussion about "any later version",
I'd point to this as the primary 'for' argument; manual relicensing to the
GPLv3 would be just as big an undertaking as any other relicensing).
But I don't see the point in making individual exceptions without a
much stronger specific reason, as one could well find oneself in charge
of Sisyphus' boulder.

> The reason I care about it in specific is that I downloaded the darcs eclipse 
> plugin yesterday.  It came with a note "For license reasons, Darcs itself is 
> not included in this software. In order to use the plugin, you need an 
> executable installed on your system. You can download Darcs at
> http://darcs.net".

When I download an ISO of a Linux distro, I get many programs under
many incompatible licenses in a single file. Various lawyers have
clearly concluded that it's 'safe' to do this. So, the Eclipse plugin
author is being paranoid.

> This also means that if I hook up darcs and the darcs eclipse plugin together
> (which has so far proved to be a non-trivial task...), I am technically
> forbidden to give the resulting setup to a friend.

Similarly untrue, unless you actually have to compile/link them together.

-- Jamie Webb




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