Would doing the following result in complete compliance with SourceForge policies?

1. Remove the CsoundVST VST plugin from all binary distributions (leaving the algorithmic composition stuff).

2. Remove the vst4cs opcodes from all binary distributions.

3. Remove the STK C++ opcodes form all binary distributions.

4. Remove all VST SDK files from Csound CVS.

However, the source code for CsoundVST's VST plugin feature, the vst4cs opcodes, the STK C++ opcodes, and the Loris opcodes would remain in CVS. It would therefore still be possible for people to separately download the VST SDK, the STK sources, or the Loris sources and build their own binaries using the existing build system.

I am going to review the SourceForge policy documentation myself.

Regards,
Mike


-----Original Message-----
>From: Anthony Kozar 
>Sent: Jul 10, 2007 12:58 PM
>To: Csound Developer list 
>Subject: Re: [Cs-dev] STK license and Sourceforge requirements
>
>Thanks Mike, I could not have said any of this any better myself.  And since
>I realized that I was not on the firmest ground myself, I decided not to
>pontificate ...
>
>I agree that we should try to comply with all Sourceforge policies to the
>best of our abilities, as I am personally very grateful for the services
>that they are providing to us.  And while I think it is an extremely remote
>possibility, we should also try to avoid any legal entanglements with
>software licenses, since if someone does decide to sue, they will likely sue
>everyone they possibly can (Sourceforge, the Csound development team, any
>Linux distros including Csound, possibly even the institutions that we all
>work for ...)
>
>Anthony
>
>Mike Coleman wrote on 7/10/07 10:06 AM:
>
>> Since SourceForge is providing the hosting more-or-less for free, and
>> in a fair way, taking reasonable steps to comply with their policy on
>> this seems like a decent thing to do.
>> 
>> There are additional reasons for getting this straight that may not be
>> apparent, too.  If this code makes it into Linux distributions and/or
>> other pieces of software, and then is later subject to court action
>> because it's being distributed (unwittingly) in an illegal way, this
>> could cause a cascade of problems for a lot of other people that, like
>> you guys, are basically just doing this for fun and maybe to make the
>> world a little bit better, and who really have no resources with which
>> to fight legal battles.  A stitch in time here may save many more than
>> nine.
>> 
>> No one would be happier than me if the worlds of "for profit" and
>> "non-profit/hobby/for-fun" could be separated so that the latter never
>> had to think about the former.  Unfortunately, that's not the state of
>> things, but a little advance preparation like this will go a long way
>> towards keeping csound out of trouble.
>
>
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Thank you very much, Michael, for looking into all of this.  I know that it
is a LOT of work.  (I have spent many hours already reading licenses, etc.)

Yes, in my opinion, # 1-4 below are necessary for compliance with SF policy.
I would also add to this list:

5.  Remove the STK library sources from the download packages.  (But retain
the Loris files for GPL compliance).

Leaving the source code for any features that we have written ourselves (or
that are licensed under an OSI-approved license) is fine.

Furthermore, I think the best course of action regarding Loris would be to
ask for an exception to the license that allows Csound and any Csound host
application to link to Loris without falling under the GPL.  If we cannot
get that from the Loris authors, then we could remove Loris binaries too and
make it a "build yourself" option.  I think that removal of Loris would be
preferable to the confusion that relicensing only some copies of Csound is
sure to generate.

Finally, I have started auditing the MacOS 9 code and will try to contact
all of its contributors to make sure that we have their permission to
distribute it under an OSI-approved license.  (I have been working under the
assumption that it is all public domain, but it would be better not to
assume).

Thanks again.

Anthony

Michael Gogins wrote on 7/10/07 1:17 PM:

> Would doing the following result in complete compliance with SourceForge
> policies?
> 
> 1. Remove the CsoundVST VST plugin from all binary distributions (leaving the
> algorithmic composition stuff).
> 
> 2. Remove the vst4cs opcodes from all binary distributions.
> 
> 3. Remove the STK C++ opcodes form all binary distributions.
> 
> 4. Remove all VST SDK files from Csound CVS.
> 
> However, the source code for CsoundVST's VST plugin feature, the vst4cs
> opcodes, the STK C++ opcodes, and the Loris opcodes would remain in CVS. It
> would therefore still be possible for people to separately download the VST
> SDK, the STK sources, or the Loris sources and build their own binaries using
> the existing build system.
> 
> I am going to review the SourceForge policy documentation myself.


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