Hi,
3DSMAX is a proprietary product marketed by Discreet (http://www.discreet.de/) and used to model and produce 3D data. It is designed so that people can write their own plugins to achieve specific functionalities.
A company (www.nevrax.org) releases 3DSMAX plugins under the GNU GPL and is embarassed in two ways:
1) Those plugins are dependant on non free software and are therefore of no use to the Free Software community.
2) It is very hard to figure out what licensing terms apply to a GNU GPL plugin in its binary form. Does it include code and data that is subject to the 3DSMAX license ?
The answer for 1) is quite clear: instead of releasing 3DSMAX plugins only, Nevrax should release similar plugins or patches to 3D modeling Free Software. They may not be as powerfull but providing a Free Software based alternative opens the way to improvement where providing only a solution based on a proprietary product increases the dependency toward the proprietary product.
The answer for 2) is less obvious. I tried to call Discreet in germany and I'm waiting for someone to call me back. There apparently is no published information on this subject. It may be completly illegal to distribute a binary plugin compiled from a GNU GPL pluging sources because it includes some portions of program and data that are under a proprietary license.
It is a good example on how dependency to non free software can paralyze a Free Software :-( We should always stay away from proprietary products.
Cheers,
A company (www.nevrax.org) releases 3DSMAX plugins under the GNU GPL
Not legally possible. Their license (the GPL) is void as not applicable.
- It is very hard to figure out what licensing terms apply to a GNU GPL plugin in its binary form. Does it include code and data that is subject to the 3DSMAX license ?
You can't have a GPL plugin for a proprietary program. That's all.
The answer for 2) is less obvious. I tried to call Discreet in germany and I'm waiting for someone to call me back. There apparently is no published information on this subject.
Please check the gpl-faq:
www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLPluginsInNF
[126]Can I use the GPL for a plug-in for a non-free program?
If the program uses fork and exec to invoke plug-ins, then the plug-ins are separate programs, so the license for the main program makes no requirements for them. So you can use the GPL for a plug-in, and there are no special requirements.
If the program dynamically links plug-ins, and they make function calls to each other and share data structures, we believe they form a single program, so plug-ins must be treated as extensions to the main program. This means that linking the GPL-covered plug-in with the main program would violate the GPL. However, you can resolve that legal problem by adding an exception to your program's license which gives permission to link it with the non-free main program.
For more details, see the question above that starts with, "I am writing free software that uses a non-free library."
It is a good example on how dependency to non free software can paralyze a Free Software :-( We should always stay away from proprietary products.
It is a good example of how you can't pretend to use the GPL as the best license for everything, in my opinion.
On Tue, 2002-03-05 at 13:27, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
A company (www.nevrax.org) releases 3DSMAX plugins under the GNU GPL
Not legally possible. Their license (the GPL) is void as not applicable.
Not true, as you note reporting the faq, you can do a special permission to link it with proprietary programs, so if nevrax add this permission to the GPL, it can be done (I'm not sure if it can be yet called GPL after the permission clause have been added, but the faq does not say the contrary).
- It is very hard to figure out what licensing terms apply to a GNU GPL plugin in its binary form. Does it include code and data that is subject to the 3DSMAX license ?
You can't have a GPL plugin for a proprietary program. That's all.
Read above!
The answer for 2) is less obvious. I tried to call Discreet in germany and I'm waiting for someone to call me back. There apparently is no published information on this subject.
Please check the gpl-faq:
www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLPluginsInNF
[126]Can I use the GPL for a plug-in for a non-free program?If the program uses fork and exec to invoke plug-ins, then the plug-ins are separate programs, so the license for the main program makes no requirements for them. So you can use the GPL for a plug-in, and there are no special requirements.
If the program dynamically links plug-ins, and they make function calls to each other and share data structures, we believe they form a single program, so plug-ins must be treated as extensions to the main program. This means that linking the GPL-covered plug-in with the main program would violate the GPL. However, you can resolve that legal problem by adding an exception to your program's license which gives permission to link it with the non-free main program.
look-^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
For more details, see the question above that starts with, "I am writing free software that uses a non-free library."
It is a good example on how dependency to non free software can paralyze a Free Software :-( We should always stay away from proprietary products.
It is a good example of how you can't pretend to use the GPL as the best license for everything, in my opinion.
Sorry, but I do not agree with you there. You may think that another licencing scheme is ok for you, but thinking GPL is not bad per se, it is only difficult to apply some times.
Simo.
Not legally possible. Their license (the GPL) is void as not applicable.
Not true, as you note reporting the faq, you can do a special permission to link it with proprietary programs, so if nevrax add this permission to the GPL, it can be done (I'm not sure if it can be yet called GPL after the permission clause have been added, but the faq does not say the contrary).
No, it's not the GPL. It's "gpl plus exception". And, as such, it's incompatible with the GPL. You can't import third-party GPL code in your GPL+exception.
Sorry, but I do not agree with you there. You may think that another licencing scheme is ok for you, but thinking GPL is not bad per se, it is only difficult to apply some times.
No, I use the GPL when I can choose. My point is just that you can't always use the GPL as a silver bullet and ignore the details.
/alessandro