[Koha] Corresponding Source under AGPL 3

[Thomas Dukleth]

[Subject changed accommodating requests for easier to follow branches of
original thread.]

Reply inline:


Original Subject: Re: [Koha] Proposal To Switch Koha's License to GPLv3
and AGPLv3 or AGPLv3

On Mon, July 12, 2010 09:13, MJ Ray wrote:
> Thomas Dukleth wrote:

[...]

>> The difficulty had been that AGPL 3 is sufficiently new that SFLC
>> has lacked the familiarity of experience to already have well
>> thought out answers to some questions about applying AGPL 3.
>
> This ^^ is exactly what I argue.  Even the expert lawyers that usually
> support our community haven't mapped all fairly obvious concerns yet.

We are agreed that SFLC has not yet given detailed attention to many
obvious aspects of AGPL 3.

If Koha would adopt AGPL 3, Koha would be in the vanguard of projects
adopting AGPL 3.  Hundreds of other projects would have proceeded Koha,
however, we would be amongst the first projects with an existing community
for which we need to take extra caution by asking serious questions and
carefully considering the answers received.


>
>> 1.2.1.  SPECIFIC APPLICATION TO KOHA.
> [...]
>> We should include Net::Z3950::ZOOM and the source code for Yaz for which
>> ZOOM is merely a wrapper.  [...]
>> We should include DBI and the dependency which we currently require
>> DBD::mysql.  [...]
>
> This makes the download size/cost problem a little bigger, as well as
> adding an element of repository management.

The repository management issue is of concern to me.  Our initial efforts
at automated support for managing the Corresponding Source in relation to
code which is incorporated into Koha but which the Koha community does not
develop will undoubtedly be less than what they should be.  The automation
will improve without any great consequence in the interval.

>
>> 2.1.  EQUIVALENT ACCESS TO PROGRAM AND CORRESPONDING SOURCE.
>>
>> As the use is in object code form for a remote network user under AGPL
>> 3,
>> the "equivalent access" provision of section 6 (d) would apply.
>> Limiting
>> the bandwidth for accessing the source code to a greater degree than the
>> limitation of the bandwidth of the program use for countries where
>> network
>> connectivity is poor and extraordinarily expensive would not be allowed.
>> This change corrects the answer given for limiting bandwidth as a remedy
>> to AGPL 3 objections given in section 3.1.1.3 of an earlier message of
>> mine in this thread at
>> http://lists.katipo.co.nz/pipermail/koha/2010-July/024391.html .
>
> So I hope everyone reads this and understands the implication: if your
> source code download is being hammered, limiting its bandwidth means
> you should limit the bandwidth to your catalogue service too!

Aaron answered today that the source code network node and the software
network node should have the same overall level of service.  They need not
have exactly the same level of service at the same time.  See his answer
to your question about taking the software offline, question Q.1.A in the
quoted message at
http://lists.katipo.co.nz/pipermail/koha/2010-July/024537.html .

>
> A corner case question is whether putting the source code as a
> Disallow in the robots.txt http://robotstxt.org/ means you should list
> the whole Koha as Disallow.  I know some libraries (those with rare
> books, for sure) like to have catalogue pages listed on search engines
> to help encourage membership.
>
>> A provider of free source code hosting services with ample bandwidth,
>> such
>> as http://www.gitorious.org/ and http://github.com/ , would be one
>> option
>> for hosting the Corresponding Source.  Contracting Corresponding Source
>> hosting services with a Koha support company would be another option.
>> [...]
>
> I remember that I have an outstanding question about availability
> linking and external hosting, but this raises another one: does this
> combine with the previous paragraph to mean that if your chosen
> cost-free source code hosting service denies bandwidth to someone,
> then your catalogue service should also deny them bandwidth?

See Aaron's answer about there being no need to take the service offline. 
Reasonable block lists are usually only temporary if used at all.

>
> So, do any of the cost-free source code hosting services publish their
> block lists?  I didn't find one.

If there is a real problem, people can change source code hosting services.

[...]


Thomas Dukleth
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