Re: Debian and the PHP license

Rasmus Lerdorf <rasmus@lerdorf.com> writes: > I see absolutely no problem with PHP projects distributed from > *.php.net carrying the PHP license. The license talks about "PHP > Software" which we define as software you get from/via *.php.net. Specifically, the license text <URL:http://php.net/license/3_01.txt> has this clause: 6. Redistributions of any form whatsoever must retain the following acknowledgment: "This product includes PHP software, freely available from <http://www.php.net/software/>". Nowhere is “PHP software” defined in the license. Will you update the license to make your above definition explicit in the license terms? > We support external repos such as github, but they are still linked > back to php.net via their pecl.php.net entries, for example. For > things that aren't distributed via pecl.php.net, pear.php.net or > www.php.net itself, I can see the argument, but those are not projects > we can do anything about. The problem is exacerbated, though, by the specific license terms. The license terms do not apply sensibly outside your stated definition; yet many software works begin outside that definition, and only later make their way to the locations you mention. This distinction is *not* the case for more widely-accepted license terms, so the distinction is easy to miss. This does not need to be the case; it is made the case by the specific terms of this license. That is a problem which can be addressed by changing the terms of the license to be generally applicable. -- \ “Those who write software only for pay should go hurt some | `\ other field.” —Erik Naggum, in _gnu.misc.discuss_ | _o__) | Ben Finney