Objective of IFSO Re: [Fsfe-ie] stuff from the past week [adelaney at cs.may.ie]

Philip Reynolds philip.reynolds at rfc-networks.ie
Fri Oct 31 20:18:30 CET 2003


"Georg C. F. Greve" <greve at fsfeurope.org> 84 lines of wisdom included:
> However: 45 of 47 licenses do not have that problem and they cover
> over 99% of the codebase we're talking about. And the problems of the
> APSL have been solved, so the old version will disappear eventually as
> the license upgrade propagates.
> 
> Which leaves 1 license out of 47 standing as the exception to the rule
> that the two are referring to identical licenses.
> 
> 
> The confusion here is a good example of the typical confusion when
> using the "Open Source" terminology. 
> 
> While you were talking about the two exception cases, the others were
> referring to using the term "Open Source" as in "proprietary software
> with some source code visible."
> 
> And that is not "Open Source as in the OSD" -- which is what I tried
> to explain.

I was under the impression open source software could be software
which distributes the source code along with the program itself.

The term "open source" is ambiguous enough, because one could
believe that the source is completely open and viewable to anybody
or the source is open for the intended recipient (i.e.  the
purchaser).

Obviously in the case of a commercial entity trying to sell the
software, the latter is the intended meaning. 

Is the latter really proprietary software? 

-- 
Philip Reynolds                      | RFC Networks Ltd.
philip.reynolds at rfc-networks.ie      | +353 (0)1 8832063
http://people.rfc-networks.ie/~phil  | www.rfc-networks.ie
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