Re: [Duplicity-talk] Version 0.5.07 Released

[Kenneth Loafman]

Michael Terry wrote:
> I know it's easy to sound accusatory or petty when talking about legal
> issues, particularly when you don't know what you're talking about, as
> I don't.  But I don't mean to be!
> 
> I think GPLv2 is a fine license, and I would in theory contribute to a
> GPLv2 duplicity.  However, I have two concerns with this move:
> 
> 1) How it was done.  It was without explanation, warning, or an
> attempt to get the permission of copyright holders.  Ian is right in
> that you can go from GPLv2 to GPLv3 fine (since presumably you used
> the 'or later' wording of GPLv2), but you can't go back down.  So the
> previous bump to v3 was fine, but this move would involve a
> relicensing effort for all patches since the GPLv3 change.

My bad... I should have asked first.

> 2) The rationale.  While GPLv2 is fine, GPLv3 is arguably better.  It
> adds specific protections.  But you say you've had commercial
> interests that don't want to contribute to duplicity because of what?
> The patent or tivoization clauses?  Does that mean that the commercial
> interests specifically have plans to contribute patented code or
> tivoize duplicity?  In which case it makes me much less excited about
> relicencing in order to allow that.

The company that wants to contribute does not want to tivoize Duplicity,
or to contribute patented code, they want to make Duplicity the backup
agent of choice for their device, and that would be a big plus for
Duplicity and everyone.

The major contributions we are discussing would be:

- make Duplicity restartable - a big issue at this point - and a fair
amount of effort to accomplish.

- make Duplicity compatible with Samba shares - this has been an issue
for a long time, one I've not had time to tackle in a manner that would
be backwards compatible.

- driving NcFTP via pexpect rather than through the NcFTP utilities,
thus removing all the utilities issues and version incompatibilities.

- multiple bug fixes, testing, and test cases.

> I happen to work with a lawyer who specializes in open source law..  I
> can ask him on Monday what the legal obligations are for relicensing
> to GPLv2, if you wanted to go ahead with this move.

I would like to hear what he has to say.

...Ken

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