Re: Berkeley DB license

* Michael A. Olson <mao@sleepycat.com> [000516 18:42] wrote:
> At 10:41 AM 5/17/00 +1000, Chris Bitmead wrote:
> 
> > Can you explain in technical terms what "surface our interfaces" means?
> 
> Basically, it would not be permitted to write trivial wrappers around
> Berkeley DB functions like db_open, simply to permit applications other
> than PostgreSQL to call them to get around Sleepycat's license terms
> for Berkeley DB.
> 
> I realize that we can argue at length about what constitutes a "trivial
> wrapper," and how much gray area there is around that.  We'd write the
> agreement so that there was plenty of room for you to improve PostgreSQL
> without violating the terms.  You'll be able to review the agreement and
> to get legal advice on it.
> 
> Let's hold the legal discussion until we decide whether we need to have
> it at all.  If there's just no technical fit, we can save the trouble
> and expense of drafting a letter agreement and haggling over terms.  If
> the technical fit is good, then the next hurdle will be the agreement,
> and we can focus on that with our full attention.

Not that I really have any say about it but...

I'm sorry, this proposal will probably lead to hurt on both sides,
one for SleepyCat possibly loosing intellectual rights by signing
into a BSDL'd program and another for Postgresql who might feel
the aftermath.

Making conditions on what constitutes a legal derivative of the
Postgresql engine versus a simple wrapper is so arbitrary that it
really scares me.

Now if SleepyCat could/would release under a full BSDL license, or
if Postgresql didn't have a problem with going closed source there
wouldn't be a problem, but I don't see either happening.

Finally, all this talk about changing licenses (the whole GPL mess),
incorperating _encumbered_ code (SleepyCat DB) is concerning to
say the least.

Are you guys serious about compromising the codebase and tainting
it in such a way that it becomes impossible for the people that
are actively working on it to eventually profit from it?

(with the exception of over-hyped IPO, but even that well has dried up)

-Alfred