Question about the GPL v3

[Chris Travers]

Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:

Section 5d:

d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display
Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive
interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need
not make them do so.

Am I right that this amounts to:

"If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices
may not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"

Here is my confusion.  THe first part says you must have these notices,
but the second says that if you don't have these notices, you don't have to.

Am I missing something obvious in the bounds of the license?  Is there
any basis for any interpretation in the license or outside?

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Ben Tilly]

On 8/16/07, Chris Travers <chris@...> wrote:

> Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:
>
> Section 5d:
>
> d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display
> Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive
> interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need
> not make them do so.
>
> Am I right that this amounts to:
>
> "If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices
> may not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"

No.

It means that you cannot add user interfaces *without* appropriate
legal notices, nor may you remove them.  You are allowed to update
them, but they must remain appropriate legal notices.

> Here is my confusion.  THe first part says you must have these notices,
> but the second says that if you don't have these notices, you don't have to.

There is a contradiction, but I think that the intent is clear.  There
are a variety of ways in which you can wind up with GPL v3 code that
has interactive interfaces that don't display appropriate legal
notices.  (The most obvious is that existing non-GPLed code gets
GPLed, but nobody adds the notices.)  In those situations, you don't
have to go through all of the interfaces and immediately change them.
But new work has to be done right.

> Am I missing something obvious in the bounds of the license?  Is there
> any basis for any interpretation in the license or outside?

Just common sense.  Hopefully other people's common sense matches mine. :-)

Cheers,
Ben

[Richard Fontana]

Chris Travers wrote:

> Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:
>
> Section 5d:
>
> d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display
> Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive
> interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need
> not make them do so.
>
> Am I right that this amounts to:
>
> "If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices
> may not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"
>
> Here is my confusion.  THe first part says you must have these notices,
> but the second says that if you don't have these notices, you don't have
> to.
>
> Am I missing something obvious in the bounds of the license?  Is there
> any basis for any interpretation in the license or outside?

It's possible that you're confused about the usage of "Program" and
"work" here. "The Program" is a term of art in GPLv[23], meaning the
work *as you received it* (that is, without further modification by
you).  In section 5 of GPLv3, references to "the work" or "your work"
are shorthand for "the new work you created by modifying the Program".

--
Richard E. Fontana
Counsel
Software Freedom Law Center
tel. [phone]
fax  [phone]

[Chris Travers]

Hi Ben;

Your reading is somewhat different than mine (my reading is simply that
"the GPL v3 is confused and confusing and is probably not clear on much
of anything").

 One of the serious issues we have in one of my projects is that some of
the developers are building POS terminal code that runs on systems with
small touch-screen displays.  This means no menus, a minimum of
interactive options, etc.  Screen real estate is at a premium and there
does not appear to be a possibility to add notices which comply with a
strict reading of the definition in section 0.  In other words, notices
may be prominent (same font size as everything else), or convenient
(printed to, say, standard output) but cannot be both.

The intent of the GPL v3 under section 0 does not appear to be the
requirement of a notice at the expense of usability (hence the
convenience requirement).  So it would seem to preclude use in something
that accepts user input but offers no convenient method of displaying
such notices.

A similar but more extreme example might be:  GPL v3 code in a
media-playing PC app.  It accepts input from a remote control and
displays song data on a small alphanumeric lcd.  This would be
interactive by most definitions.  Yet, displaying the required notices
on that aphanumeric lcd would be extremely inconvenient and would
therefore not meet the terms of the license.  Am I missing something?  
Anyway the problem we are having is similar in the sense of limited
information throughput even if the throughput is not quite as limited.

Are either of these consistent with either the wording or intent of the
GPL v3?

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Chris Travers]

Richard Fontana wrote:

> Chris Travers wrote:
>  
>> Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:
>>
>> Section 5d:
>>
>> d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display
>> Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive
>> interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need
>> not make them do so.
>>
>> Am I right that this amounts to:
>>
>> "If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices
>> may not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"
>>
>> Here is my confusion.  THe first part says you must have these notices,
>> but the second says that if you don't have these notices, you don't have
>> to.
>>
>> Am I missing something obvious in the bounds of the license?  Is there
>> any basis for any interpretation in the license or outside?
>>    
>
> It's possible that you're confused about the usage of "Program" and
> "work" here. "The Program" is a term of art in GPLv[23], meaning the
> work *as you received it* (that is, without further modification by
> you).  In section 5 of GPLv3, references to "the work" or "your work"
> are shorthand for "the new work you created by modifying the Program".
>
>  

 From section 0:

“The Program” refers to any copyrightable work licensed under this
License. Each licensee is addressed as “you”. “Licensees” and
“recipients” may be individuals or organizations.
...
A “covered work” means either the unmodified Program or a work based on
the Program.


I suppose one reading of the definitions might agree with you. I would
argue that the above definitions suggest that the terms "The Program"
and "covered work" are mutually inclusive and hence don't have much
difference in meaning.

I suppose you might be right in intent though. It certainly sucks for
people working with interactive but limited user interfaces because the
GPL v3 appears to prevent use of code in those environments.

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Donovan Hawkins]

On Thu, 16 Aug 2007, Chris Travers wrote:

> Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:
>
> Section 5d:
>
> d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display Appropriate
> Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive interfaces that do not
> display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need not make them do so.
>
> Am I right that this amounts to:
>
> "If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices may
> not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"

I think they are saying:

"If your derived work has UIs, they must display Appropriate Legal
Notices; however, if the original program has UIs that do not display
Appropriate Legal Notices, you don't have to modify them to do so if you
keep those UIs in your derived work."

Thus you cannot remove the notices and you must include them in any NEW
UIs that you create, but you don't have to retrofit UIs that were part of
the original work if they are lacking the notices.

"Program" refers to the original, unmodified work under license. "Covered
work" refers to both the original work and your derived work, though in
this case it would seem to refer to your derived work.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Software Engineer                     safer than biology, for while the
hawkins@...                   hazards of physics drop off as 1/r^2,
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[Chris Travers]

So, the general concensus here seems to be that if one has an
interactive but limited user interface not suited for displaying legal
notices, then one cannot use GPL v3 code.

Does this seem to be correct?

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Matthew Flaschen]

Chris Travers wrote:
> So, the general concensus here seems to be that if one has an
> interactive but limited user interface not suited for displaying legal
> notices, then one cannot use GPL v3 code.

If it's actually impossible to display the legal notices, then I would
say it's not really an interactive interface.  If it's only
inconvenient, that's okay because the notice need only be displayed when
the user selects the option for this ("If the interface presents a list
of user commands or options, such as a menu, a prominent item in the
list meets this criterion.")

Matt Flaschen

[Richard Fontana]

Chris Travers wrote:

> Richard Fontana wrote:
>> Chris Travers wrote:
>>  
>>> Though this may be a typo, it seems incredibly unclear to me:
>>>
>>> Section 5d:
>>>
>>> d) If the work has interactive user interfaces, each must display
>>> Appropriate Legal Notices; however, if the Program has interactive
>>> interfaces that do not display Appropriate Legal Notices, your work need
>>> not make them do so.
>>>
>>> Am I right that this amounts to:
>>>
>>> "If the work has ineractive user interfaces, Appropriate Legal Notices
>>> may not be removed though they may be updated as appropriate?"
>>>
>>> Here is my confusion.  THe first part says you must have these notices,
>>> but the second says that if you don't have these notices, you don't have
>>> to.
>>>
>>> Am I missing something obvious in the bounds of the license?  Is there
>>> any basis for any interpretation in the license or outside?
>>>    
>>
>> It's possible that you're confused about the usage of "Program" and
>> "work" here. "The Program" is a term of art in GPLv[23], meaning the
>> work *as you received it* (that is, without further modification by
>> you).  In section 5 of GPLv3, references to "the work" or "your work"
>> are shorthand for "the new work you created by modifying the Program".
>>
>>  
> From section 0:
>
> “The Program” refers to any copyrightable work licensed under this
> License. Each licensee is addressed as “you”. “Licensees” and
> “recipients” may be individuals or organizations.
> ...
> A “covered work” means either the unmodified Program or a work based on
> the Program.
>
>
> I suppose one reading of the definitions might agree with you. I would
> argue that the above definitions suggest that the terms "The Program"
> and "covered work" are mutually inclusive and hence don't have much
> difference in meaning.

"Covered work" means either "the Program" (the work as you received it)
or "a work based on the Program" (which in GPLv3 means your modified
version of the work you received, and does not mean the unmodified
version that you received).  (Were your reading correct, there would
have been no need to use any term other than "the Program".)

--
Richard E. Fontana
Counsel
Software Freedom Law Center
tel. [phone]
fax  [phone]

[Chris Travers]

Matthew Flaschen wrote:

> Chris Travers wrote:
>  
>> So, the general concensus here seems to be that if one has an
>> interactive but limited user interface not suited for displaying legal
>> notices, then one cannot use GPL v3 code.
>>    
>
> If it's actually impossible to display the legal notices, then I would
> say it's not really an interactive interface.  If it's only
> inconvenient, that's okay because the notice need only be displayed when
> the user selects the option for this ("If the interface presents a list
> of user commands or options, such as a menu, a prominent item in the
> list meets this criterion.")
>  

Part of the problem is that the GPL v3, section 0 requires that

"Appropriate Legal Notices" must be convenient from the perspective of
the user.  The second problem is limited UI's can certainly be
interactive in the sense of interacting with the user (is there another
definition of "interactive" that I should know about?).

I suppose one option for the POS app might be: by default display the
copyright notice, wait for user input, and then go to the rest of the
application, but provide a way to start the application without the
notice (command-line switch that tells it to bypass this).  This way
everyone will generally start the application without the notice, but it
takes more work than to actually see the notice, and newbies who don't
read the docs will almost certainly see the notice.

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[David Woolley (E.L)]

Chris Travers wrote:
> So, the general concensus here seems to be that if one has an

I don't see a consensus.  I only see you. A consensus requires the
same, normally compromise, position to be taken bay everyone.

> interactive but limited user interface not suited for displaying legal
> notices, then one cannot use GPL v3 code.

Your MP3 example is poor, because one would only expect the notice
at power on and branding, copyright notices and elaborate splash
screens are already common on powerup.

This, however is not a good place for questions about the GPL as its
drafters have no commitment to monitor here.


--
David Woolley
Emails are not formal business letters, whatever businesses may want.
RFC1855 says there should be an address here, but, in a world of spam,
that is no longer good advice, as archive address hiding may not work.

[Chris Travers]

For what it is worth, I have also sent the question to gnu@....

David Woolley wrote:

> Chris Travers wrote:
>> So, the general concensus here seems to be that if one has an
>
> I don't see a consensus.  I only see you. A consensus requires the
> same, normally compromise, position to be taken bay everyone.
>
>> interactive but limited user interface not suited for displaying
>> legal notices, then one cannot use GPL v3 code.
>
> Your MP3 example is poor, because one would only expect the notice
> at power on and branding, copyright notices and elaborate splash
> screens are already common on powerup.
>
> This, however is not a good place for questions about the GPL as its
> drafters have no commitment to monitor here.
>
>

[chris.vcf]

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[Chris Travers]

I guess I may have possibly found a way out of this issue.  Figured I
would run it by everyone else.

I don't read the GPL v3 as precluding other permissive terms, possibly
on a per-file basis.  Is there any reason to think that an individual
implementing an additional interactive interface by adding new files to
a program could not provide permission to omit the legal notices for the
interfaces provided in the file?  (i.e. "you have permission to
implement the interactive interfaces in this file without adding
Appropriate Legal notices as otherwise required by the license")

Best WIshes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Donovan Hawkins]

On Sun, 19 Aug 2007, Chris Travers wrote:

> I don't read the GPL v3 as precluding other permissive terms, possibly on a
> per-file basis.  Is there any reason to think that an individual implementing
> an additional interactive interface by adding new files to a program could
> not provide permission to omit the legal notices for the interfaces provided
> in the file?  (i.e. "you have permission to implement the interactive
> interfaces in this file without adding Appropriate Legal notices as otherwise
> required by the license")

IANAL, but I think you would need to obtain that permission from all GPL
v3 code used in the project, not just from the code that implements the
additional interface. If you used my code in your program, then my use of
unmodified GPL v3 requires that you include Appropriate Legal Notices on
any interface that invokes my code. You would probably even have to use
them on all interfaces of a program that contains my code, regardless of
whether that interface can invoke my code.

Otherwise you could simply replace all the interfaces of my program, add
your permissive terms to those interfaces, and you would have a version of
my program with no notices. Interfaces are often trivial in comparison to
the program itself, so this would be a very easy way to circumvent GPL v3
if it were allowed.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Donovan Hawkins, PhD                 "The study of physics will always be
Software Engineer                     safer than biology, for while the
hawkins@...                   hazards of physics drop off as 1/r^2,
http://www.cephira.com                biological ones grow exponentially."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Chris Travers]

Donovan Hawkins wrote:

> On Sun, 19 Aug 2007, Chris Travers wrote:
>
>> I don't read the GPL v3 as precluding other permissive terms,
>> possibly on a per-file basis.  Is there any reason to think that an
>> individual implementing an additional interactive interface by adding
>> new files to a program could not provide permission to omit the legal
>> notices for the interfaces provided in the file?  (i.e. "you have
>> permission to implement the interactive interfaces in this file
>> without adding Appropriate Legal notices as otherwise required by the
>> license")
>
> IANAL, but I think you would need to obtain that permission from all
> GPL v3 code used in the project, not just from the code that
> implements the additional interface.

Hmmm...  Not sure I agree with that reading.  Here is my reasoning based
on decisions made by other projects.  IANAL either, of course.

I see no reason to read the GPL v3 any differently than the GPL v2 with
regard to questions of additional permissions of original but derivative
elements.  In short, I don't think that either license precludes
offering additional permissions to original code even if that is
derivative of GPL code.  The GPL v[23] also very explicitly separates
additional terms based on whether they are permissive or restrictive.

In short you are *only* required to release your code under the GPL and
an appropriate version.  You are not required to release your code
*only* under the GPL and appropriate version.  Let us look at two
analogous cases under the GPL v2:

1)  ndiswrapper.  This work, arguably a derivative of the Linux kernel,
allows one to link the Linux kernel to proprietary WIndows NDIS
drivers.  Nobody has ever challenged the author's right to add a linking
exception to this code unambiguously allowing the use of Windows NDIS
drivers with the code (though arguably such a linking exception may not
generally be required as questions of derivation or what constitutes the
work as a whole probably would not include them).

2)  nVidia closed source Linux drivers.  The general argument in favor
of nVidia is that kernel-level core logic was included in such a way
that it was not derivative of the Linux kernel and is therefore not
covered under the GPL.  However, the nVidia driver distribution does
also include another set of code, derived from *both* the Linux kernel
and the nVidia proprietary elements which is released under a license
generally acknowledged to be compatible with both licenses provided that
there are not questions as to whether there exists a work as a whole
which encompases both the GPL and nVidia proprietary elements (and even
if there is, nVidia does not seem to be distributing such a hypothetical
work as a whole).  The nVidia example suggests that derivative elements
outside the work as a whole may clearly add permissions not found in the
GPL.

So this seems to raise the following questions:

Does such a file, if derived but distributed separately from another
GPL'd work allow for original elements (i.e. new user interfaces) to
bear additional permissions?  It seems clear to me that the answer is yes.

If that file is incorporated back into the main work as a whole do those
permissions go away?  I don't think so.  Even if they do, you run back
into the fact that the GPL v3 does not require you to add such notices
if they are missing.

If someone does give permission to drop the notices for interfaces they
add, this is not distributed separately even at first, and these are
included, is this actionable by another developer?  I really don't
know.  It is, however, hard for me to see how this would be
differentiable from the case listed above if the contributor in question
retained copyrights to his/her contribution.

THe problem however in the last case seems to me that it makes the
appropriate legal notices clause very weak and seems to say "it is OK to
intentionally exclude yourself from this requirement, but if you do so
accidently...."  But the same thing exists with regard to linking
exceptions in GPL v[23] as well.  Nothing in the GPL v2 forbids linking
exceptions to works under incompatible licenses for content under one's
own copyright ownership.  The question is how different this sort of
thing is.

We are actually considering what to do about the license of the project
at the moment (currently GPL v2 or later).  We may go LGPL v2, stay with
the current arrangement, GPL v3, or GPL v2 with linking exceptions to
GPL v3.  I don't like what I see in the GPL v3. and the release of the
license poses a number of possible problems for the project down the
road including eroding some of the main protections that the GPL v2 has
provided.

Best Wishes,
Chris Travers

[chris.vcf]

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[Donovan Hawkins]

On Sun, 19 Aug 2007, Chris Travers wrote:

> In short, I don't think that either license precludes offering
> additional permissions to original code even if that is derivative of GPL
> code.

<snip>

> Does such a file, if derived but distributed separately from another GPL'd
> work allow for original elements (i.e. new user interfaces) to bear
> additional permissions?  It seems clear to me that the answer is yes.
>
> If that file is incorporated back into the main work as a whole do those
> permissions go away?  I don't think so.  Even if they do, you run back into
> the fact that the GPL v3 does not require you to add such notices if they are
> missing.


You can add as many additional permissions as you want to your derivative
work, but they apply only to your derivative work.

Look at copyright law in general. If I create a derivative work from your
copyrighted work, I hold copyright on the derivative work. Even if I have
no permission to use your work, you likewise have no permission to use my
work. My derivative work is in limbo, and is only usable by someone who
has permission from both of us. This issue has come up before with anime
fansubs: fans who take Japanese shows, subtitle them into English, and
give away copies of the combination. The fansubs aren't legal because the
shows are copyrighted, but that doesn't mean the licensor of the show can
steal the subtitles for use on his own DVD release.

So here we have GPL v3 and a similar situation. You have used my GPL v3
software to create your GPL v3 derivative work and would like to add an
additional permission to use your new interface without including
Appropriate Legal Notices. My software has a legal notice on it, and you
want to release your derivative without that legal notice on your new
interface. When and where did I give you the right to apply that
additional permission to my work? The rights I granted are within the four
corners of GPL v3 and it doesn't say anything about forcing me to accept
your permissions.

You have certainly granted that permission with respect to your derived
work, but that permission is meaningless without the same permission from
me. I released my software with an explicit requirement that ALL
interfaces must contain my legal notice, and you cannot release anyone
else from that requirement. Your derivative work could not be used unless
someone adds back my legal notice.

So what effect does your permission have? If someone were to take your
derivative work and remove all my code, they could use your interface in
their own program and not put any of your legal notices on it.


> We are actually considering what to do about the license of the project at
> the moment (currently GPL v2 or later).  We may go LGPL v2, stay with the
> current arrangement, GPL v3, or GPL v2 with linking exceptions to GPL v3.  I
> don't like what I see in the GPL v3. and the release of the license poses a
> number of possible problems for the project down the road including eroding
> some of the main protections that the GPL v2 has provided.

I don't think the GPL v3 is as weak as you suggest, though I sympathize in
general with the difficulty in finding a good license to release under.
I'm right now conteplating whether to create my own license, add
permissive terms to GPL, or just give up and settle for GPL for my own
open source software.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Donovan Hawkins, PhD                 "The study of physics will always be
Software Engineer                     safer than biology, for while the
hawkins@...                   hazards of physics drop off as 1/r^2,
http://www.cephira.com                biological ones grow exponentially."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------