Re: [Savannah-hackers] savannah.gnu.org: submission of Educational Information System

[Jaime E. Villate]

On Tue, Jan 15, 2002 at 10:19:29AM +0100, Dominique Broeglin wrote:
>       Oups, I didn't see it in the text surrounding the form. I just
> rechecked it, maybe I misunderstood the text "It already exists and you
> can see it at http://server/file"; I put the URL of the development site.
> Which contains a download section for the source. Anyway, here are the
> anonymous CVS instructions :
> 
> cvs -d :pserver:address@hidden:/export/essi login
> Password : anoncvs 
> cvs -d :pserver:address@hidden:/export/essi co eis

Sorry; you did give us the URL for the project, but since it included "/wiki/"
in its path, my prejudiced mind assumed it was just a page for the discussion
of EIS development. Since I erased your project registration, you will have to
register it again in Savannah (and the new registration will most probably be
evaluated by someone different from me).

> > Keep in mind that only host projects that do not depend on any
> > non-free software. Isn't Java 2 Enterprise Edition framework proprietary?
>
>       Here I need your help. I discussed with some persons on edu-eu. Some
> think it is, some do not.
Java 2 Enterprise Edition is definitely non-free software.

> As I understand what I read on the GNU web
> site, my application is under GPL and I do not use any non-free
> software, even if most of the libraries I use are non-GPL-compatible.
There is no doubt that your project is free software. What we're trying to
decide is whether we can host it in Savannah or not (if it really depends on
Java 2 Enterprise Edition, we can't)

> I will try to give you the information I have :
>       J2EE is merely a specification (publicly available). Altough SUN has
> published a non-free reference implementation, I do not use it.
Then your project does not use J2EE. There are free implementations of Java;
if your project works with those, there is no problem.

> I use JBoss which is under LGPL.
OK, no problem.
>       The database I use is SapDB which is under GPL (but since PostgreSQL
> has greatly improved its Java Driver I could port the code to PSQL,
> which would be easier for users).
No problem either.

>       I also use some XML Java technology :
> 
>       JAXP (Java API for XML Processing) is publicly specified by SUN but I
> use Xalan's implementation. Xalan and Xerces (XSLT processor and XML
> parser) are under the Apache License which is free. I've seen that a GPL
> version of JAXP is under development in the GNU project.
No problem. The FSF does not recommend using the Apache license in the
development of your own software, but they don't see anything wrong in using
software with the Apache license (such as the Apache http server, for
instance).

> Once it is functionnal I could easily replace Xerces and Xalan by the GPL
> implemenation.
It is always good to let users choose the XSLT processor they prefer (Xalan,
xsltproc, Sablotron, etc); If you follow the XSLT standard your software
should not depend on Xalan. But even if it does, I don't see anything wrong.
You do not have to feel obliged to use a GPL'ed XSLT processor.

>       I also use FOP (XML to PDF processor). Fop depends on Batik (SVG
> visualizer)
Very unfortunately, SVG has become a non-free specification, with patent
problems; please avoid it. There are some FOP processors. In any case, I'm not
familiar enough with Batik to say if it really depends on SVG and I don't know
if you are really generating SVG graphics files or not.

> They both are under Apache License but I could not find any
> GPL implementation (even at an early stage).
Again, there's no problem in using free-software licensed under the Apache
license.

>       For my grammar I used ANTLR which is in the public domain. But I could
> use some GPL parser generator (I just had no experience with them, and
> not much time to learn ;-)
You do not have to use only GPL software; the important thing is not creating
any conflicts with the GPL which you use for your own code. Please take a
look at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl_faq.html

>       My main concern, was that once I developped the application, any person
> or institution willing to use it could use it without paying anything
> and without restrictions.

Very good way of thinking I wish my colleagues who developed the
Information System for our University would have thought like you. We are
certainly willing to help you achieve your goals.

Cheers,
Jaime