Licence violations and incompatibilities

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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Tsar Hoikas » Fri Aug 05, 2011 11:27 am

diafero wrote:But PhysX is not derived work of CWE, so it does not become subject of the GPL. From all I heard, the only ones that could have anything against using a closed-source library in an open-source application are the authors of that application, as their code is shipped with code not licensed correctly. If they add an exception to their license, all is fine.

If what you say is true, Hoikas, a license exception by Cyan would not gain us anything at all - after allit wouldn't change the fact that PhysX is used in a GPL application.


We link with PhysX, therefore PhysX is affected by the viral GPL clause, which means we violate the PhysX EULA, so nvidia can sue us. With the exception, the GPL would not affect PhysX, which would keep us safe from that.

Trylon wrote:Just a stupid idea here, but what about just putting in the exception (probably wise to do it on an experimental basis at first), and don't bother until complains about it?
It's not like there's anyone who has a really good reason to file a complaint against that, right.... I mean, it seems like the lesser of two evils... There's jsut Cyan and some fans who like to see a binary release on the one side, and NVidea who doesn't care about the engine on the other side...


That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Stucuk » Fri Aug 05, 2011 11:33 am

Tsar Hoikas wrote:That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).

Wouldn't you only need there permission if there code was effected by the changes? If i made a modification to a file that dealt with player chat to make it so all chat messages contain the letter "a" then i wouldn't expect to be able to sue you because you added an exception for PhysX to the license. In any case isn't the lesser of two evils to have it so only the community can sue you rather than someone who may actually try to sue you? How many people who have made changes to URU are likely to want to sue you, let alone have the finances and time to bother?
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Tsar Hoikas » Fri Aug 05, 2011 11:47 am

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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Stucuk » Fri Aug 05, 2011 12:42 pm

Does that then mean that you can't add new libraries to URU which would require an exception without everyone's permission(Don't see how that would be the case)? I don't see how an exception for PhysX should effect anyones "Rights" if it doesn't effect any of the code they have contributed(Then again my idea of Open Source is actual Open Source where you can do whatever you want as long as you Attribute people).
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Trylon » Fri Aug 05, 2011 1:17 pm

Tsar Hoikas wrote:That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).


In theory yes, but would they , and if they did, would it really become a big problem?
Once they come forward, something can probably be settled, can't there? Like removing their code parts or something. It's not likely that Cyan would sue, since they put in the physX dependency in the first place, and the contributing fans would probably rather see a working binary than legal hassle. Except maybe for the odd one out, and that code might be removable... Or am I mistaken?

Just thinking aloud here ofcourse - I know it's being caught between a rock and a hard place....

EDIT: This is why I really don't like the GPL, and ususally use LGPL or MIT in my own code if possible.
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Deledrius » Fri Aug 05, 2011 3:35 pm

Trylon wrote:EDIT: This is why I really don't like the GPL, and ususally use LGPL or MIT in my own code if possible.

There's a time and place for GPL; sometimes it's the right license and other times not so much. The fact that it treats freedom so restrictively bothers me sometimes.

In this case however, the problem lies not in the GPL, but in an improperly-applied GPL. The same problem would occur with nearly any other license without the due effort and attention needed when selecting and applying it.
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby GPNMilano » Fri Aug 05, 2011 5:18 pm

Tsar Hoikas wrote:That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).


See, this is what I don't understand though. Those that have contributed code under the current GPL could sue us sure. But...they are us. There's 11 contributors for the GoW's fork, and however many for the OpenUru fork. All of which acknowledge this is a problem. So if you all agree it is a problem, and the only issue that would come from changing it yourselves is that Cyan, or the other contributors would sue you. And the only ones you haven't heard back from is Cyan. That sounds to me like you have permission from everyone BUT Cyan. So change it. If Cyan wants to complain and sue you they will, but obviously what are the chances of that happening when you're just fixing a mistake they made themselves? Do you think they will have an issue with not waiting for them to ask you permission to fix it themselves? I don't think they will.
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Tsar Hoikas » Fri Aug 05, 2011 5:47 pm

GPNMilano wrote:
Tsar Hoikas wrote:That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).


See, this is what I don't understand though. Those that have contributed code under the current GPL could sue us sure. But...they are us. There's 11 contributors for the GoW's fork, and however many for the OpenUru fork. All of which acknowledge this is a problem. So if you all agree it is a problem, and the only issue that would come from changing it yourselves is that Cyan, or the other contributors would sue you. And the only ones you haven't heard back from is Cyan. That sounds to me like you have permission from everyone BUT Cyan. So change it. If Cyan wants to complain and sue you they will, but obviously what are the chances of that happening when you're just fixing a mistake they made themselves? Do you think they will have an issue with not waiting for them to ask you permission to fix it themselves? I don't think they will.


All of us *here* agree, yes. Unfortunately, not all of the 11 contributors are here.
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby GPNMilano » Fri Aug 05, 2011 6:24 pm

Tsar Hoikas wrote:
GPNMilano wrote:
Tsar Hoikas wrote:That would be a big no-no... Then anyone who has contributed code under the vanilla GPL could sue us. They have to all agree to relicense their code under the GPL with our modifications (the PhysX exception).


See, this is what I don't understand though. Those that have contributed code under the current GPL could sue us sure. But...they are us. There's 11 contributors for the GoW's fork, and however many for the OpenUru fork. All of which acknowledge this is a problem. So if you all agree it is a problem, and the only issue that would come from changing it yourselves is that Cyan, or the other contributors would sue you. And the only ones you haven't heard back from is Cyan. That sounds to me like you have permission from everyone BUT Cyan. So change it. If Cyan wants to complain and sue you they will, but obviously what are the chances of that happening when you're just fixing a mistake they made themselves? Do you think they will have an issue with not waiting for them to ask you permission to fix it themselves? I don't think they will.


All of us *here* agree, yes. Unfortunately, not all of the 11 contributors are here.


But...there's like...one of the 11 contributors that hasn't commented on it. Wouldn't it just be easier and less of a hassle to email him and say "Hey we need to fix this to distribute the binaries we compile. You okay with adding the permission so we can do that?" From what i've seen the only person that isn't usually in IRC and thus wouldn't know about this is philipe. If you're all concerned about this, just contact that one person and ask him if he's okay with it.
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Re: Licence violations and incompatibilities

Postby Tsar Hoikas » Fri Aug 05, 2011 6:49 pm

Backstory: That question got answered in IRC: It still comes back to Cyan


Some interesting reading regarding the 3ds Max plugin.
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