[PolyORB-users] Questions about licensing after close scrutiny by Debian

[Ludovic Brenta]

Vadim Godunko writes:
> Ludovic Brenta wrote:
>> 
>> Although I could not download the orig.tar.gz file of your package, I checked
>> out the PolyORB Subversion sources and found files in ./testsuite/idls/test*
>> with the following header:
>> 
>> // Copyright (c) 1997 X/Open Company Ltd., A member of The Open Group.
>> //
>> // All rights reserved. No part of this source code may be reproduced,
>> // stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any
>> // means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise,
>> // except as stated in the end-user licence agreement, without the prior
>> // permission of the copyright owners.
>> 
> All files inside testsuite can be safely excluded.

But this precludes us from running the test suite as part of the build
process.  If necessary, so be it.

>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Alcatel
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1989- 2001, Hewlett-Packard Company
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Highlander Communications, L.C.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Inprise Corporation
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1995 - 2001, IONA Technologies, Ltd.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998 - 2001, Lockheed Martin Federal Systems, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, 2001, Lucent Technologies, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Nortel Networks
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 2002,Object Management Group, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, 2001, Objective Interface Systems, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Object-Oriented Concepts, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1991 - 2001, Sun Microsystems, Inc.
>> ./idls/RTCORBA/RTCORBA.idl://Copyright � 1998,1999, Tri-Pacific Software, Inc.
>> 
> This file required for RT-CORBA. Here is complete copyright note in it:
>
> The companies listed above have granted to the Object Management Group,
> Inc. (OMG) a nonexclusive, royalty-free, paid up, worldwide license to
> copy and distribute this document and to modify this document and
> distribute copies of the modified version. Each of the copyright holders
> listed above has agreed that no person shall be deemed to have infringed
> the copyright in the included material of any such copyright holder by
> reason of having used the specification set forth herein or having
> conformed any computer software to the specification.

This seems to indicate nobody except the Object Management Group is
allowed to modify these files or redistribute even pristine copies.
This makes these files non-free.  I think we'll exclude RT-CORBA too
from the PolyORB distribution, then.

>> ./compilers/ciao/ada_be-mappings-dsa.adb:--          Copyright (C) 1999-2002 ENST Paris University, France.          --
>> ./compilers/ciao/ciao-types.ads:--  Copyright (C) 1999 �cole nationale sup�rieure des t�l�communications.
>> ./compilers/ciao/ciao-alloc.ads:--  Copyright (C) 1999 �cole nationale sup�rieure des t�l�communications.
>> ./compilers/ciao/ciao-hostparm.ads:--  Copyright (C) 1999 �cole nationale sup�rieure des t�l�communications.
>> 
> These files also can be excluded.

Th big problem I have with all this is the statement from AdaCore that
all of these files are licensed under GPL.  I think this is untrue;
AdaCore has no power to change the licensing terms of these files
without the original copyright holder's written consent.

I think it is simply illegal for AdaCore to distribute these files under
GPL (or GMGPL for that matter).  But, of course, IANAL.

-- 
Ludovic Brenta.