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license too ill

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  license too ill bob <bob@coolfone.comze.com> - 2012-03-17 04:57 -0700
    Re: license too ill Jussi Piitulainen <jpiitula@ling.helsinki.fi> - 2012-03-17 16:46 +0200
      Re: license too ill Nomen Nescio <nobody@dizum.com> - 2012-03-17 20:42 +0100
        Re: license too ill "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> - 2012-03-17 21:36 +0100
        Re: license too ill James Dow Allen <jdallen2000@yahoo.com> - 2012-03-18 07:29 -0700

#1369 — license too ill

Has anyone else been confused about whether they can use other's code or not?

I see licenses like MIT, Apache, GNU, GLPL, and I honestly have no idea what the real deal is.  Do I need to get a law degree to understand these?

How do most programmers learn the gist of the common licenses?

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#1370

bob writes:

> Has anyone else been confused about whether they can use other's
> code or not?

Yes.

> I see licenses like MIT, Apache, GNU, GLPL, and I honestly have no
> idea what the real deal is.  Do I need to get a law degree to
> understand these?

I don't have a law degree. You have been warned.

The real deal is simple: you are not allowed to use other people's
code. Without their permission, that is. The authors of the code can
do nothing about it even if they would like to. It's the copyright
law.

The licenses you list give you the permission to use the code. They
are public licenses, so they don't mention you specifically, but if
you use the code and follow the conditions of the license and the
copyright holder decides to sue you, the license is there to protect
you.

(The GNU licenses are called GPL and Lesser GPL aka LGPL, and GNU
itself is not a license at all.)

If you want to use the protection of the license without following its
conditions, things get more complicated. Get that law degree and
prepare to defend yourself.

The most important condition you need to understand is the copyleft:
some of the licenses require you to use the same conditions if you
distribute the work or a derived work. This may be complicated if two
different licenses require this and you use code under both.

Permissive licenses only allow you to pass the freedom on and don't
require it.

Free software / open source licenses give you rights that copyright
laws by default deny you. They don't take away from what little
copyright laws already allow. In particular, a short, trivial piece of
code is not protected to begin with.

To draw the precise line between short and non-short, trivial and
non-trivial, get that law degree. (It may be simpler to simply write
your own code when in doubt.)

> How do most programmers learn the gist of the common licenses?

Vaguely at best, I suppose.

The Free Software Foundation documents their point of view at fsf.org,
The Open Source Initiative theirs at opensource.org, and Wikipedia has
a useful-looking article on Free Software Licence.

Learn about their motivation (and your own!), about the basic kinds of
conditions (attribution, no advertisement, copyleft; some others may
not be compatible with free software and open source licenses).

Ignore the rants, except maybe those that are funny.

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#1371

> bob from google groups writes:
> 
> > I see licenses like MIT, Apache, GNU, GLPL, and I honestly have no
> > idea what the real deal is.  Do I need to get a law degree to
> > understand these?

No, you have to understand the difference between capitalism and socialism.

MIT and BSD licenses are true free source code licenses. The basic meaning
of the MIT license is "enjoy my code". The basic meaning of the BSD license
is "enjoy my code, but don't try to say you wrote this. If you use my code
in your code you have to include this copyright and give me credit. That is
all I ask". If you use MIT or BSD code you can use it however and wherever
you want. You can sell it or give it away. You can provide source or
not. It's free, so it's all up to you.

Don't know about Apache.

GPL says "I'm a dogfaced socialist who doesn't work as a paid developer or
most likely at any job at all. I'm simply a motherfucking bum living in a
van down by the river. I believe I have the instrinsic right to use whatever
you people who do get paid produce, by virtue of the fact I live in a van
down by the river ipso facto I have the right to reach into your pocket and
take a piece of whatever you earn and make. After all if the government does
it, I can too. I understand you accomodate non-producing bums like me by
virally infecting anybody who uses your code and more power to you, man! If
you use this code in your code, then you must make the source code
available. The main point is making programming as a career worthless
because the intention is to destroy the concept of property rights and
ownership."

It's just icing on the cake Stallman and his fucked up band of followers
created a new religion based on robbing people blind and shutting down
commercial software development. If you use GPL code in your code, you MUST
license that code under the GPL, and you MUST make source available. You
MUST do what THEY BELIEVE or they will try to force you to comply by
dragging you to court. Doesn't sound very free to me, but I am not a lawyer.

> Permissive licenses only allow you to pass the freedom on and don't
> require it.

What is a permissive license you lying sack of shit? There is no such thing
as passing freedom on. You motherfucking GPL groupies will not pervert
reality and expect to get away without someone calling you what you
are. Lying dogfaced socialist motherfuckers!

> Free software / open source licenses give you rights that copyright

No girlfriend, nobody gives you rights. Rights are something you already
have, nobody can take them away from you, although FSF/GNU try real hard.

> > How do most programmers learn the gist of the common licenses?

They don't, since most of the "programmers" using GPL code or writing it are
just cut & paste jockeys who can't code for shit. If they could, they would
be making money and selling their code under license. The few good guys who
do write good code and give it away use true free licenses like MIT and BSD
(look at the BSD projects for example).

The safe bet: look at GPL code as an example of how not to code. Look at MIT
or BSD code and try to write your own, be a man. If you need to use
something, use something MIT or BSD licensed and drop the author an email
and say hey man thanks for this code, it helped me do this or that.

> Ignore the rants, except maybe those that are funny.

Expected from a dogfaced socialist ass-kissing GPL groupie. You told the guy
nothing factual, as usual you just repeated the GPL mantra and did your
usual wordgames with freedom, as if you motherfucking dogfaced socialist
bastards have any idea what freedom actually means. There aren't 3 freedoms,
you stupid sonsofbitches, there is just freedom.

Freedom means do whatever you want. Anything else isn't freedom. The GPL
from FSF/gnu.org is a viral, forcible, open source license. It is not a free
software license. Don't use it unless you're a dogfaced socialist or aspire
to be one.

--
Just say "No" to GPL.
Friends don't let friends use GPL code.

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#1372

On Sat, 17 Mar 2012 20:42:37 +0100 (CET), Nomen Nescio wrote:

> GPL says "I'm a dogfaced socialist who doesn't work as a paid developer or
> most likely at any job at all. I'm simply a motherfucking bum living in a
> van down by the river. I believe I have the instrinsic right to use whatever
> you people who do get paid produce, by virtue of the fact I live in a van
> down by the river ipso facto I have the right to reach into your pocket and
> take a piece of whatever you earn and make. After all if the government does
> it, I can too. I understand you accomodate non-producing bums like me by
> virally infecting anybody who uses your code and more power to you, man! If
> you use this code in your code, then you must make the source code
> available. The main point is making programming as a career worthless
> because the intention is to destroy the concept of property rights and
> ownership."

There is the GM GPL (GNAT-modified GPL) which does not infect the code.

> It's just icing on the cake Stallman and his fucked up band of followers
> created a new religion based on robbing people blind and shutting down
> commercial software development.

Silly to hold Stallman responsible. Software market was killed by software
patents, by no-warranty licenses, by monopolists like Microsoft, by unfair
competition etc. Actually we have to thank Stallman for having at least
some diversity after the markets of OSes, compilers, word processors, you
name it, were ruined one by one.

Left or right, the lawmakers do everything to make things only worse. That
is not a Stallman's fault.

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de

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#1373

Has anyone else noted the surprising correlations in
American "thought"?  For example, people who favor tax cuts
for the rich are more likely to favor war?
People opposed to gay sex are more likely to disbelieve AGM?
Et cetera, et cetera.

On Mar 18, 2:42 am, Nomen Nescio <nob...@dizum.com> wrote:
> GPL says "I'm a dogfaced socialist who doesn't work as a paid developer or
> most likely at any job at all. I'm simply a motherfucking bum living in a
> van down by the river. I believe I have the instrinsic right to use whatever
> you people who do get paid produce, by virtue of the fact I live in a van
> down by the river ipso facto I have the right to reach into your pocket and
> take a piece of whatever you earn and make. After all if the government does
> it, I can too. [rant rant rant]

Having a few minutes to spare I made a bet with myself and clicked
"Find posts by this user" to see if I'd win the bet.

In addition to rants about prostitution web sites (sorry didn't have
time to see if they were pro or con) I found

Nomen Nescio <nob...@dizum.com> wrote:
> Bret Cahill Shits His Panties Again: More Bad News For Obozo
> ... as rising gasoline prices ...
> How's That Hopey-Changey Thing Working Out For You?

I won my bet.  If I'd clicked some more I'm sure I'd "learn"
what a hypocrite Al Gore is, but I'd already wasted enough time
on Mr. Nescio.

James

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