Just whiling away the time... On Apr 27, 2009, at 14:02 , mabshoff wrote: > <SNIP> >> Well, IANAL. Looking at COPYING in Maxima's source distribution it >> says: >> >> [quote] >> Maxima is dedicated to the memory of William F. Schelter. On 6 >> October >> 1998 William F. Schelter was formally notified that he could >> distribute >> DOE-MACSYMA upon terms of his choosing, in particular the GNU General >> Public License: <http://www.ma.utexas.edu/users/wfs/maxima-doe- >> auth.gif> >> Schelter proceed to distribute derived works under the GPL. >> >> In the formal notification a request was made that a paragraph >> "should >> be included in the GPL and should accompany other modifications, >> enhancements or derivative works of your program." This paragraph is >> transcribed below in honor of that request. Like the preamble it does >> not form part of the license. >> >> "Distribution of such derivative works is subject to the U.S. Export >> Administration Regulations (Title 15 CFR 768-799), which implements >> the >> Export Administration Act of 1979, as amended, and/or the >> International >> Traffic in Arms Regulations, of 12-6-84, (Title 22 CFR 121-130), >> which >> implements the Arms Export Control Act (22 U.S.C. 2728) and may >> require >> license for export." >> >> GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE >> Version 2, June 1991 >> [end quote] >> >> The paragraph about the "request" does not seem to agree with the GIF >> where it states > > Sorry, it does agree with the quote in COPYING. The sentence I think > is problematic is > > "This paragraph is transcribed below in honor of that request. Like > the preamble it does not form part of the license." > > You can distribute Maxima under GPL + additional permissions, but then > the above looks like a restriction to me ;). I.e. IMHO (And IANAL > still applies) you cannot distribute code under the GPL and then on > top claim "Well, if you live in such and such place you might need an > export license". > > I have been looking at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html, but > there are various questions and answers about "additional > permissions" , but nothing in the direction of "additional > restrictions" that seem to match. From an amateur standpoint this > export restriction seems like an additional restriction that would > make the code GPL incompatible. Maybe someone ought to contact FSF's > licensing people?
The thread that Tim pointed to in the Debian lists includes a note claiming that the FSF's Copyright Enforcement Bureau (I may be recalling the name incorrectly) gave the OK to do just what the Maxima folk have done in the above. As usual FOUAL, but that never stops this kind of thread :-} Justin -- Justin C. Walker, Curmudgeon-At-Large Institute for the Absorption of Federal Funds -------- If you're not confused, You're not paying attention -------- --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ To post to this group, send email to sage-devel@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to sage-devel-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/sage-devel URLs: http://www.sagemath.org -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
