Re: [boost] Re: Draft of new Boost Software License

From: Peter Dimov (pdimov_at_[hidden])
Date: 2003-07-08 12:17:33

David Abrahams wrote:
> "Peter Dimov" <pdimov_at_[hidden]> writes:
>
>> * Why is the new license better?
>
> I'll get the lawyers to comment on this in more detail, but here are
> some answers as I understand them:
>
>    Big picture: it has been vetted by lawyers for reducing ambiguity
>    and risk for corporate legal departments, while protecting Boost
>    developers by disclaiming implicit guarantees.

The underlying assumption being that making source available for download
free of charge leads to implicit guarantees. But I'm not sure that this is
the case. That's why I'm asking.

>> I'd like also to point out that it seems to me that the old "in all
>> copies" form is better than the new one; the legal system is
>> sufficiently flexible to reliably recognize a "copy" (i.e. a
>> password protected RAR archive of an mp3 encoded song).
>
> I'm not sure about that.  The problem is that the old version didn't
> distinguish source code copies from object code copies.

I think it does. Object code is not a copy of the source code.

>> The new wording seems to allow self-extracting archives
>> of "the Software" to not carry the license.
>
> Good point.  A simple "copies of the source" might work better than
> the wording we have now.

It's redundant. The text "all copies" in a source file implies "all copies
of this source file". If you consider object code to be a copy of the
source, changing "copies" to "copies of the source" doesn't help.