[Nagiosplug-devel] Plugin licensing

[Kevin Menard]

Thanks for the write-up, Ton.  Also, thanks to everyone else that chimed
in.

Based on what I'm hearing, I should be good to go with either the ASL or
BSD.  I'm writing the plugin(s) in Python and as such, am not linking in
either the C headers or the CPAN module.  I'll just have to be diligent
about working from the documentation rather than the GPL plugins as
sources of inspiration.

Thanks again,
Kevin 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: nagiosplug-devel-bounces at lists.sourceforge.net 
> [mailto:nagiosplug-devel-bounces at lists.sourceforge.net] On 
> Behalf Of Ton Voon
> Sent: Thursday, July 19, 2007 4:47 AM
> To: Nagios Plugin Development Mailing List
> Subject: Re: [Nagiosplug-devel] Plugin licensing
> 
> 
> On 19 Jul 2007, at 07:03, sean finney wrote:
> 
> > On Wednesday 18 July 2007 23:19:55 Kevin Menard wrote:
> >> getting murkier.  Given that I'm not a lawyer and don't 
> profess to be 
> >> one, I'll probably just go with the consensus here.  Does a Nagios 
> >> plugin have to be GPL'd?
> 
> Sean's response was accurate, from my point of view, so I've 
> stuck it on our website:
> 
> http://nagiosplugins.org/index.php? 
> option=com_easyfaq&task=view&id=12&Itemid=29&mosmsg=Changes+to+item 
> +saved
> 
> Any comments?
> 
> I was thinking that when I create a new C plugin, I usually 
> copy an existing one and strip out everything except the 
> getopt handling and the help stuff. Then the new bits are 
> just the communication with the external system. However, 
> under the definitions above, this would mean it is a derived 
> work, so would have to be GPL'd.
> 
> Then I was thinking, maybe we could provide a library with 
> headers and have that under LGPL, but we use a lot of gnulib 
> code (getopt handling, internationalisation) which is GPL'd, 
> not LGPL'd, so our executable would have to be GPL'd.
> 
> If you wanted to protect some intellectual property, you'd 
> have to make a library which returned all the data you 
> wanted, and then create a plugin which is GPL'd, but only 
> uses the library API to get at the information.
> 
> Alternatively, to make a plugin NOT under GPL, you'd have to 
> write it from scratch without any external libraries which 
> are GPL'd, which is certainly possible, though a bit more work.
> 
> Remember, the aim of the Free Software Foundation is to make 
> all software free.
> 
> Ton
> 
> http://www.altinity.com
> T: +44 (0)870 787 9243
> F: +44 (0)845 280 1725
> Skype: tonvoon
> 
> 
> 
> 
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