[josm-dev] License clarification for JOSM plugins

Ulf Lamping ulf.lamping at web.de
Mon Apr 14 20:53:34 BST 2008


Giovanni Mascellani schrieb:
> All'incirca Mon, 14 Apr 2008 19:06:34 +0200,  Ulf Lamping
> <ulf.lamping at web.de> sembrerebbe aver scritto:
>   
>> Well, first of all, there's already a debian package for JOSM and the 
>> Plugins in the osm subversion which is maintained by Joerg Ostertag.
>>     
> I wasn't aware of this. Are these packages kept up-to-date? Could you
> please give me an exact link? (OSM SVN is quite slow for me right now,
> so it's a pain to search for the .debs you're talking about). :-)
>   
You'll find the sources at: 
http://trac.openstreetmap.org/browser/applications/editors/josm/debian

Sorry, I don't know the location of the binaries.
>> Anyway, please be careful that you can/should distribute JOSM (and
>> it's plugins) under GPL v3!!!
>>
>> The provided JOSM license text LICENSE states V2 and unless all JOSM
>> and Plugin files clearly states "GPLv2 or later" somewhere (which
>> they don't do AFAIK), there's no legal way IMHO  to provide JOSM
>> under GPLv3 - as the license versions are not compatible.
>>     
> Well, if someone tells me "GPL" my understatement is that he's talking
> about any version on the GPL, just like, if he told me about "a
> flower", I would understand "a flower of any color", not just "a yellow
> flower".
>
> Most of the files in JOSM SVN report just "GPL". A few others are more
> clear: "GPLv2 or later". Some files don't have copyright notices. And I
> spotted right now a file which is copyrighted by Sun and distributed
> under a Sun's license, but it shouldn't be a problem for Debian.
>
> That's precisely what I'm asking you: could you please make the
> licensing terms more clear?
>
> Here is the list without licensing notice, if this can ease your work:
>  * command/RotateCommand.java
>  * gui/mappaint/IconElemStyle.java
>  * gui/mappaint/ElemStyles.java
>  * gui/mappaint/ElemStyleHandler.java
>  * gui/mappaint/AreaElemStyle.java
>  * gui/mappaint/ElemStyle.java
>  * gui/mappaint/MapPaintStyles.java
>  * gui/mappaint/LineElemStyle.java
>  * gui/dialogs/RelationListDialog.java
>  * gui/dialogs/RelationEditor.java
>  * gui/layer/markerlayer/PlayHeadMarker.java
>  * gui/preferences/AudioPreference.java
>  * tools/FallbackDateParser.java
>  * tools/PrimaryDateParser.java
>  * tools/Pair.java
>  * data/osm/DateFormatter.java
>  * data/osm/RelationMember.java
>  * data/osm/Relation.java
>
> Regards, Giovanni.
>   
Hmmm, if the LICENSE test provided is GPLv2 and no other real 
information is given, why not use GPLv2?

I'm not in the position to clarify things here, as my attributions to 
JOSM are only tiny, but in my opinion you should simply use GPLv2 and 
all is well ;-)

Regards, ULFL





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