[Box Backup] Exclude lists

Ben Summers boxbackup@fluffy.co.uk
Wed, 23 Feb 2005 09:52:05 +0000


On 22 Feb 2005, at 20:49, Chris Wilson wrote:

> Hi Ben,
>
>> You can link against a BSD project from a GPL project, no problem. 
>> It's compatible that way. It's the other way which isn't compatible 
>> -- if a modification is made under GPL then it cannot be accepted 
>> into the BSD project.
>
> I'd be very happy if you would allow me to distribute Box Backup and 
> my program (Boxi, under the GPL) in the same package, but under two 
> separate licenses. Any modifications that I make to Box in that 
> package would of course be licensed under the Box license, not the 
> GPL.
>
> Would you prefer that I distribute an official tarball of Box and a 
> set of patches within my package, or would including the Box source be 
> enough? Since Boxi don't need all of Box Backup to build, I could trim 
> it down to save space until such time as a system-wide shared library 
> for Box is available.

Maybe that's the best compromise. Distribute the official tarball 
within your distribution archive, as a .tgz file of course, and patch 
it as necessary. Shouldn't be too hard to do. And I would be perfectly 
happy if you did this.

Are you building your project within the framework? If so, I have some 
scripts which configure up a parallel structure, so you could trivially 
access the Box Backup code without having to add files within the 
existing tree.

>> I don't think I can give you permission to release the Box code under 
>> the GPL. However, as I read the BSD license, there isn't a problem 
>> with just including a lump of BSD code in a distribution as a 
>> separate entity. I suggest you ask someone who knows!
>
> Can anyone recommend someone for me to ask? I don't know any qualified 
> software lawyers. Could the Free Software Foundation help? 
> [http://www.fsf.org]

No idea, I'm afraid.

Sorry to be so awkward. I'm afraid licensing is not an area I'm 
particularly familiar with, and I'm trying to follow the recommendation 
of choosing a license, and sticking to it without messing around with 
it.

Ben