GPL Questions Continued, Developer related

[mcsmom]

Answering Nant's question from the other thread.

Q1: Who are the copyright/license owners of Joomla 1.0.X and 1.5 ?

Open Source Matters has the copyright on the combined entity. The copyright is derivative of the underlying copyrights held by the people who developed the code and is subject to licensing limitations.

Q2: Who are the copyright/license owners of 3P extensions that work with Joomla?
The developers of those extensions.

Thanks for responding...

Now let me continue this - if I may ...

I read that the copyright/license owner (sorry - i always view these as the same - if i should please correct me) is the only entity empowered to enforce (or not) any license issues. So if I create a component - that the Joomla license/copyright owners view as derivative works - then only the Joomla license/copyright owners can go after the component developer (actually the component distributor to be more correct). Is this statement correct?

I'm not a lawyer, but from my understanding that is basically correct. I think that the original copyright owners who assigned their copyright to Joomla! would also have standing.  But don't use me as any authority.

I think that we will eventually have some kind of further documentation or faq that addresses the issues people are raising, so if anyone has a question like this, post away. Just don't expect a definitive answer immediately. We will be keeping SFLC busy with these issues, and they are very thorough.

[nant]

Answering Nant's question from the other thread.

Q1: Who are the copyright/license owners of Joomla 1.0.X and 1.5 ?

Open Source Matters has the copyright on the combined entity. The copyright is derivative of the underlying copyrights held by the people who developed the code and is subject to licensing limitations.

Q2: Who are the copyright/license owners of 3P extensions that work with Joomla?
The developers of those extensions.

Thanks for responding...

Now let me continue this - if I may ...

I read that the copyright/license owner (sorry - i always view these as the same - if i should please correct me) is the only entity empowered to enforce (or not) any license issues. So if I create a component - that the Joomla license/copyright owners view as derivative works - then only the Joomla license/copyright owners can go after the component developer (actually the component distributor to be more correct). Is this statement correct?

I'm not a lawyer, but from my understanding that is basically correct. I think that the original copyright owners who assigned their copyright to Joomla! would also have standing.  But don't use me as any authority.

I think that we will eventually have some kind of further documentation or faq that addresses the issues people are raising, so if anyone has a question like this, post away. Just don't expect a definitive answer immediately. We will be keeping SFLC busy with these issues, and they are very thorough.

once again, thanks ...

now lets say that a component (for joomla) creator releases his/her creation as GPL (just like the Joomla license owners desire) and someone else takes that component and makes some changes and releases something else.

Is the initial component creator tagged with the task to enforce GPL?
Will Joomla license owners step in, even though they are not the license owner of the system that the offending code was derived from?
And if the J! license owners step in, when does this stop?
Or doesn't it stop at all?

[mcsmom]

Theoretically, it never stops. As a practical matter, everything is on a case by case basis.

For example, it might depend on WHY the author didn't choose to step in and what the nature of the violation is.

[bobbio2007]

What about extensions for components? Or even themes for components? For example Docman allows theme uploads and Virtuemart allows custom modules. These extensions rely on the component, not Joomla, the component relies on Joomla. Do they fall under the component's license or Joomla's? And no, it can't be both.

[nant]

Theoretically, it never stops. As a practical matter, everything is on a case by case basis.

For example, it might depend on WHY the author didn't choose to step in and what the nature of the violation is.

I find this highly unlikely.
Hopefully, the lawers (because the ball is in their court now - pun intended) can address this.

[mcsmom]

Theoretically, it never stops. As a practical matter, everything is on a case by case basis.

For example, it might depend on WHY the author didn't choose to step in and what the nature of the violation is.

I find this highly unlikely.
Hopefully, the lawers (because the ball is in their court now - pun intended) can address this.

What do you think is unlikely?

[XHTMLSuite]

Talking about templates being exempt from having to be released under GPL I understand that this also applies to a WYSIWYG editor that can exist outside of Joomla! (stand-alone) and thus has to be considered as a separate work, allowing me to license it under whatever license I want to.

Is this correct?

If so, then the only thing I have to release under GPL would have to be

a) the Mambot/Plugin

and (if available)

b) the component that let's the user configure the editor through?

Please, no answers like "ask your lawyer".

[quote="jcracknell"](Mod edit: quote of attack against community member was edited from this post - MMMedia)[/quote]

Thanks!

Bernhard

Edited: Removed my comment to quote of jcracknell - didn't mean to offend, just found the wording funny.

[nant]

Theoretically, it never stops. As a practical matter, everything is on a case by case basis.

For example, it might depend on WHY the author didn't choose to step in and what the nature of the violation is.

I find this highly unlikely.
Hopefully, the lawers (because the ball is in their court now - pun intended) can address this.

What do you think is unlikely?

(damn, I wish i was a lawer - well only for 10 mins to use some legal terms)

for one it is in contradiction with the previous statement you made - that only the license/copywrite owner can enforce.

and - my intuition tells me that this act cannot go on forever, so it has to stop somewhere - and imo this somewhere is the first hop.

[nant]

What about extensions for components? Or even themes for components? For example Docman allows theme uploads and Virtuemart allows custom modules. These extensions rely on the component, not Joomla, the component relies on Joomla. Do they fall under the component's license or Joomla's? And no, it can't be both.

(waiting to see this movie)

[nant]

Also, from the announcement:

There is a bit of complication here in that if extensions are separate works under copyright law, they are beyond the reach of the GPL, and are thus compliant even if they are not GPL-compatible.  The current architecture makes it extremely difficult to write nontrivial extensions that are separate works.  We are currently researching our options in this area.

What does this mean - researching our options?

Because - as in most cases people can interpret this in various ways ...

for example:

does researching our options relate to "the current architecture makes it extremely difficult to write nontrivial extensions that are separate works"?

if yes, does it mean that the J! team is investigating methods to make this separate works creation easier or what?

[Chris Davenport]

What about extensions for components? Or even themes for components? For example Docman allows theme uploads and Virtuemart allows custom modules. These extensions rely on the component, not Joomla, the component relies on Joomla. Do they fall under the component's license or Joomla's? And no, it can't be both.

(waiting to see this movie)

Given that the Joomla! component is GPL, then extensions to the component will probably need to be GPL too.  Themes are a bit trickier as it depends on how they work.  Images, CSS and so on can be proprietary (because they're not "code").  It isn't possible to give a blanket answer.  We had to face the same issue with Joomla! templates as you know.

Regards,
Chris.

[nant]

What about extensions for components? Or even themes for components? For example Docman allows theme uploads and Virtuemart allows custom modules. These extensions rely on the component, not Joomla, the component relies on Joomla. Do they fall under the component's license or Joomla's? And no, it can't be both.

(waiting to see this movie)

Given that the Joomla! component is GPL, then extensions to the component will probably need to be GPL too.  Themes are a bit trickier as it depends on how they work.  Images, CSS and so on can be proprietary (because they're not "code").  It isn't possible to give a blanket answer.  We had to face the same issue with Joomla! templates as you know.

Regards,
Chris.

Really?

Sorry, I believe you are not entirely right on this one.

If the component extension interacts with the component via a component API (that has no J! code in it), then J! has no say on this matter.

Please - for the sake of all the confused members of this community - lets all be careful with our answers - especially if they have legal implications (since most of us are not lawers).

no offense intented

[nant]

What about extensions for components? Or even themes for components? For example Docman allows theme uploads and Virtuemart allows custom modules. These extensions rely on the component, not Joomla, the component relies on Joomla. Do they fall under the component's license or Joomla's? And no, it can't be both.

My answer (and please note I am not a lawer) ...

J! components should be released by their creators in GPL compliant licenses. The J! license/copyright owners are the only ones that can enforce this (this has been stated in many posts on the GPL extensions thread).

The creator of a J! component is the license/copyright owner of his/her component. If he/she releases in a non GPL compatible license then the J! license/copyright owners can pursue that he/she complies (options are: convince him/her to comply, sue or ignore).

The creator of the J! component, being the license/copyright owner (no one can take that away from the component creators - well hopefully) is (just as in J! case) the only entity that can enforce compliance of derivative works based on his/her component.

Once again - I am not a lawer - but neither are most giving answers here.

[Chris Davenport]

Really?

Sorry, I believe you are not entirely right on this one.

If the component extension interacts with the component via a component API (that has no J! code in it), then J! has no say on this matter.

Please - for the sake of all the confused members of this community - lets all be careful with our answers - especially if they have legal implications (since most of us are not lawers).

no offense intented

Joomla! is GPL and we believe, as already stated, that most Joomla! components will need to be GPL too.  So given that the component is released as GPL then you will need to look at how the extension (to the component) interacts with the component.  It doesn't matter if the extension calls the Joomla! API or not, since the component is GPL the extension will probably need to be too.

It isn't certain because it depends on how the component and its extensions are written.  Part of the problem lies with PHP being an interpreted language, so maybe a compiled language extension might be different.  I don't know.  If you really want to have proprietary extensions and you want to build a business on it, then you really must consult a lawyer.  There's no simple answer.

Regards,
Chris.

[mattm]

I'm not here to step on toes. Or cause any misgivings.  But the Rocketlauncher that Rockettheme currently put together is confusing.

The entire package is being distributed and licensed on a per site basis. This includes an install of Joomla ,several modules, scripts,basically a turnkey joomla site. When advertising a complete package. Does this not break the GNU/GPL? Naming it Rocketlauncher tells me its a program set up to install everything as a compiled works and therefore everthing contained in the compiled works must comply the the GPL

Correct me if I'm wrong and please explain why this is or is not effected.

You answer may help clear some confusion on this matter.

[marlar]

I think we all can agree that some templates might comply with GPL and that some extensions might as well.

But then:

If you feel that an individual extension is completely agnostic and uses their own classes and a whole heap of other maybes and conditionals then quite potentially it might be exempt from being required to be part of the GPL, but the only person who knows the answer to that is a lawyer who has the skills to do a code examination and determine if the GPL is applicable to the work.

Why on earth should extensions turn around a lawyer each time somebody wants to ensure it's compliant, while templates are given a carte blanche?

Can you tell me the reason for this difference? Why don't you advice template developers to seek legal advice each time the want to publish a template, just to make sure?

I also have a template that has two lines of Joomla! code, I could make it completely agnostic and run a few checks to see if those functions exists and immediately it becomes a static, non Joomla! powered page, or some slight alterations turn it into a Drupal template.

And I have advanced extensions (mambots) with only a few lines of Joomla code to retrieve contents and parameters and to send the modified content back to Joomla. That is in fact the case of most if not all content mambots. So using your argumentations, at least mambots should be allowed to be non GPL.

[Jenny]

Mod note:

The rules are being enforced in full in this thread.  Any personal attacks against any members of the community will be removed immediately.  If you need a refresher of the forum rules they are located here: http://forum.joomla.org/index.php/topic,65.0.html .

A post with personal attacks was removed.  Thank you for understanding.

Edit:  Also a post with a quote of the attack was edited to remove it, the rest of the post was kept intact.

[Jinx]

Hi Bernhard,

Talking about templates being exempt from having to be released under GPL I understand that this also applies to a WYSIWYG editor that can exist outside of Joomla! (stand-alone) and thus has to be considered as a separate work, allowing me to license it under whatever license I want to.

Yes, that would be correct, if you can demonstrate that the editor is a seperate work - for most editors this wouldn't be that hard since they can run standalone - they can be licensed under any license you see fit.

If so, then the only thing I have to release under GPL would have to be
a) the Mambot/Plugin
b) the component that let's the user configure the editor through?

Yes, that would be correct. Especially the mambot/plugin will always need to be GPL'ed, in our opinion mambots/plugins are to tightly woven into the core to be ever considered non-derivative.

Does this answer your questions ?

Johan

Edit : Spell-checking.

[Chris Davenport]

I think we all can agree that some templates might comply with GPL and that some extensions might as well.

But then:

If you feel that an individual extension is completely agnostic and uses their own classes and a whole heap of other maybes and conditionals then quite potentially it might be exempt from being required to be part of the GPL, but the only person who knows the answer to that is a lawyer who has the skills to do a code examination and determine if the GPL is applicable to the work.

Why on earth should extensions turn around a lawyer each time somebody wants to ensure it's compliant, while templates are given a carte blanche?

As I understand it, parts that are not "code" are not covered by the GPL.  Templates are not given carte blanche as the code parts of them will need to be GPL-compliant.  However, in most cases, the important parts of most templates are not "code", they're things like images, CSS and HTML.  It's my understanding that things like that can be under a different (possibly proprietary) licence.

Can you tell me the reason for this difference? Why don't you advice template developers to seek legal advice each time the want to publish a template, just to make sure?

I also have a template that has two lines of Joomla! code, I could make it completely agnostic and run a few checks to see if those functions exists and immediately it becomes a static, non Joomla! powered page, or some slight alterations turn it into a Drupal template.

And I have advanced extensions (mambots) with only a few lines of Joomla code to retrieve contents and parameters and to send the modified content back to Joomla. That is in fact the case of most if not all content mambots. So using your argumentations, at least mambots should be allowed to be non GPL.

Plugins (formerly known as mambots) are code.  And it's code that depends on Joomla!.  So it will need to be GPL if you want to distribute it.  If you distribute it under the GPL then you don't need a lawyer.

Regards,
Chris.

[Jenny]

Another note:

A post using foul language and attacks on community members was removed.  Feel free to repost your discussion or question without using attacks and without using foul language.

[marlar]

Plugins (formerly known as mambots) are code.  And it's code that depends on Joomla!

NO! You are entirely wrong here.

Only the interface parts depend on Joomla. And that is only a few lines of trivial code. The rest does not at all depend on Joomla.

Content mambots typically get some html from Joomla, process that html and send it back. It's the middle part that is important, not the rest. And if you think that all code is inherently GPL, then you are wrong. I'm not sure this is want you meant when saying "plugins are code", I just want to clarify it. BTW, html and css is also code!

Want a proof of my claim?

As a courtesy to a user I have long time ago made a modification of my MosHide mambot so that it runs happily outside Joomla. I could do this because it was very little work for me.

And I could do the same with most of my mambots.

And I could even do this with most of other people's mambot! 

[Pomond]

Wow, what a fascinating discussion.  I had a couple of thoughts to share:

First, I think that it's worthwhile to commend the core Joomla! team for tackling this issue in a very open and forthright manner.  This is a fugly topic that opens up a huge can of worms, and I think that everyone would agree that it's better to deal with this now than let it fester. 

That being said, this issue does raise a mess of questions and uncertainties, especially since it gets into the subtleties of how some very complicated systems interact (not to mention the big concern: money).  Perhaps it would help if the core team and community moderators set up some way to channel the most relevant legal questions to an actual lawyer.  I've seen how Slashdot lets users vote on questions, the most popular of which are passed to a featured expert, and the questions and answers are posted online for everyone to see.  Could Joomla! do something similar?  Maybe get a lawyer from the Free Software Foundation to agree to answer some community questions?  (For free, naturally.)

Perhaps providing some Joomla!-sponsored channel for answering the most relevant legal questions would go some distance toward enlightening everyone, dealing with some specific topics that remain as yet unresolved and mollifying those Joomla! community members who feel they need to have some questions answered.

[Elpie]

I may be able to provide some assistance in clearing up confusion over templates.

I have had legal opinions from two lawyers over the relationship between templates and the GPL. Templates, such as those used with Joomla, are made up of essentially three or more parts - images which are copyright but not GPL, CSS, and the HTML/PHP part of the template. There are parts of them that are entirely dependent on the core and as such must be licensed the same way. In Joomla 1.0.x, this means the index.php. XHTML/HTML is code and while it provides the mechanism for the design to be rendered, it is not a design element. It has to be treated like any other code.

CSS, however, does not necessarily invoke the viral nature of the GPL because it is an independent file that is simply included when the browser calls it. It is not executed by Joomla!  So, distributing the index.php (to use the 1.0.x example) does not force the distribution of the CSS and images alongside it to be made under the terms of the GPL.

Nutshell - index.php must be GPL, images and CSS can be licensed under whatever license the copyright holder chooses.
I hope this helps.

[MuffinDCC]

I may be able to provide some assistance in clearing up confusion over templates.

I have had legal opinions from two lawyers over the relationship between templates and the GPL. Templates, such as those used with Joomla, are made up of essentially three or more parts - images which are copyright but not GPL, CSS, and the HTML/PHP part of the template. There are parts of them that are entirely dependent on the core and as such must be licensed the same way. In Joomla 1.0.x, this means the index.php. XHTML/HTML is code and while it provides the mechanism for the design to be rendered, it is not a design element. It has to be treated like any other code.

CSS, however, does not necessarily invoke the viral nature of the GPL because it is an independent file that is simply included when the browser calls it. It is not executed by Joomla!  So, distributing the index.php (to use the 1.0.x example) does not force the distribution of the CSS and images alongside it to be made under the terms of the GPL.

Nutshell - index.php must be GPL, images and CSS can be licensed under whatever license the copyright holder chooses.
I hope this helps.

Thank you for sharing that, hopefully this will help the understanding of templates and licensing much better, as confirmed by your legal advice

[marlar]

Nutshell - index.php must be GPL, images and CSS can be licensed under whatever license the copyright holder chooses.

Yes - if they are distributed separately from the GPL parts. GPL states that if they are distributed together, then the whole package becomes GPL.

[mattm]

The index.php in turn usually contains all licensing tems for the entire works. Which basically has stripped away the GPL.

[XHTMLSuite]

Hi Bernhard,

Talking about templates being exempt from having to be released under GPL I understand that this also applies to a WYSIWYG editor that can exist outside of Joomla! (stand-alone) and thus has to be considered as a separate work, allowing me to license it under whatever license I want to.

Yes, that would be correct, if you can demonstrate that the editor is a seperate work - for most editors this wouldn't be that hard since they can run standalone - they can be licensed under any license you see fit.

If so, then the only thing I have to release under GPL would have to be
a) the Mambot/Plugin
b) the component that let's the user configure the editor through?

Yes, that would be correct. Especially the mambot/plugin will always need to be GPL'ed, in our opinion mambots/plugins are to tightly woven into the core to be ever considered non-derivative.

Does this answer your questions ?

Johan

Edit : Spell-checking.

Hi Johan,

thank you for the very clear answers.

As for demonstration of the editor being a separate work, I assume it would be sufficient if I'd point a link to a stand-alone version of my editor in case this needs to be proven?

Thanks again.

Bernhard

[marlar]

Yes, that would be correct. Especially the mambot/plugin will always need to be GPL'ed, in our opinion mambots/plugins are to tightly woven into the core to be ever considered non-derivative.

I have now in less than 30 minutes made a standalone version of my famous Multihumb mambot. I just cut away the interface parts. Instead it now expects raw html from somewhere - doesn't matter.

So I can now distribute the mambot under any licence I see fit?

And you know what? I can do this with all my mambots.

If that doesn't proof your assumptions are incorrect, then what does?

[Amras]

Just had a thought about something else, what about flash, flex, silverlight or whatever in that line.

Would those be considered "images" and thus part of the template that has nothing todo with the GPL?

Flash (Actionscript), Flex can run without Joomla! at all, it just has to be put in a javascript object witch uses a external javacript file, or you can use Joomlas database to pull information from at rumtime you can also use the javascript libaries but you dont have to.

[Elpie]

Nutshell - index.php must be GPL, images and CSS can be licensed under whatever license the copyright holder chooses.

Yes - if they are distributed separately from the GPL parts. GPL states that if they are distributed together, then the whole package becomes GPL.

Thats not quite what the GPL says. You can distribute proprietary code alongside GPL code if they communicate at arms length and are deemed to be separate work.

IANAL - I just passed on the legal opinions I received. However (personal opinion) a Joomla site cannot display anything unless there is a template index.php (sticking to my 1.0.x example so as not to complicate things). A site can function perfectly well without the template having a CSS file. Or images. It might not look much, but it will work. Nothing changes in either Joomla or the template index.php when a CSS file is added - all that changes is the way the browser renders the site and produces the visual effect.

The Joomla lawyers may not agree with my interpretation over the distribution but from reading the announcement it seems likely that they intend the template index.php to be GPL and the design elements non-GPL (unless the copyright holder licenses them that way).
This is a question I hope will be put to the lawyers so its clear for everyone.