Open Source licences...

[deathadder]

Hey,

I know it's not exactly a Linux question but it is open source

I'm having to learn C# .NET forms stuff at the moment for various boring reasons, none of which I can change..., and wanted to write something useful to help me learn. Once I've decided what it is, I wanted to release it.

I know it can't be released under the GPL because of linking to various closed DLLs etc and I'm not too familiar with other licences (BSD/MIT/Apache/etc) but would any of those allow me to release the source code?

I'm looking into it at the moment but wanted to get peoples opinions about the different licence options available.

If there's not a "open source" licence I can use, I'll just have to make the source available free-of-charge as it were

[retsaw]

AFAIK, linking to closed DLLs doesn't stop you releasing under the GPL, but what you really need to do is check the licence of the software you are linking to and developing with to see if they restrict the license you can release you software under. You might want to look at the FSFs webpage on licenses and they have an email address where you can ask them questions on licenses if you need to.

[deathadder]

Ah thanks, I was pretty sure that it was a problem with the GPL...I'll check that this evening (I wouldn't be surprised if I was completely wrong, it's been one of those days).

Thanks for the link, I'll check it out this evening!

[gamblor01]

I recommend releasing it as beerware!!! Basically, anyone else is free to modify it as they see fit. And if they should happen to run into you on the street one day, they can buy you a beer if they think your software is worthy.

Just FYI, the BSD/MIT/Apache licenses essentially allow you to do whatever you want to the code and release it in any way that you want.

The main idea behind GPL is that you may modify it for your own personal use, but if you release a new update to a program previously under the GPL (or you include that GPL code anywhere in your code) then you must release all of the changes you made...so basically you have to release all of your source code.

It is always a fantastic idea to check and see what license the software you are linking to. In your case, according to the FSF, it really depends on which DLL's you are linking. Here is a good description with links to the relevant text:

http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/faq.html##faq9


Then again...lawyers can scrutinize any piece of text and present that the same sentence/paragraph offers 2 different interpretations, each of which are polar opposites!