License Issue

PostGresQL Admin,

I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to be
able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal to
connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
stalled due to the following language in one of the files:

File: src/backend/port/dynloader/readme.dlfcn.aix

Language: "Permission is granted to freely use, copy, modify, and
redistribute this software, provided that no attempt is made to gain
profit from it..."

We are not planning to modify PostGreSQL, nor charging for support
services.

Given that we are building commercial applications, can I get
confirmation that we allowed to use (in-house) and deploy (to our
customers) PostGresQL to support our applications?

Thank you,

____________________________________________________________________

Randy May

On Tue, 2009-04-21 at 11:13 -0400, May, Randy wrote:
> PostGresQL Admin,
>
This is more of a hackers discussion. I am forwarding there.

-Hackers,

Do we have a history on this file?

Joshua D. Drake

>
>
> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to be
> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal
> to connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:
>
>
>
> File: src/backend/port/dynloader/readme.dlfcn.aix
>
> Language: "Permission is granted to freely use, copy, modify, and
> redistribute this software, provided that no attempt is made to gain
> profit from it..."
>
>
>
> We are not planning to modify PostGreSQL, nor charging for support
> services.
>
>
>
> Given that we are building commercial applications, can I get
> confirmation that we allowed to use (in-house) and deploy (to our
> customers) PostGresQL to support our applications?
>
>
>
> Thank you,
>
>
>
> ____________________________________________________________________
>
> Randy May
>
>
>
>
>
>
--
PostgreSQL - XMPP: jdrake(at)jabber(dot)postgresql(dot)org
Consulting, Development, Support, Training
503-667-4564 - http://www.commandprompt.com/
The PostgreSQL Company, serving since 1997

May, Randy wrote:
> PostGresQL Admin,
>
>
>
> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to be
> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal to
> connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:
>
>
>
> File: src/backend/port/dynloader/readme.dlfcn.aix

The actual file name, case-sensitive, is:

File: src/backend/port/dynloader/README.dlfcn.aix

> Language: "Permission is granted to freely use, copy, modify, and
> redistribute this software, provided that no attempt is made to gain
> profit from it..."
>
>
>
> We are not planning to modify PostGreSQL, nor charging for support
> services.
>
>
>
> Given that we are building commercial applications, can I get
> confirmation that we allowed to use (in-house) and deploy (to our
> customers) PostGresQL to support our applications?

Wow, I don't remember anyone seeing that before, and am sure it would
have been an issue if they had seen it because it has been in the source
tree since 1997/12/19. And aix.[ch] have unusual copyrights:

* @(#)dlfcn.h 1.4 revision of 95/04/25 09:36:52
* This is an unpublished work copyright (c) 1992 HELIOS Software GmbH
* 30159 Hannover, Germany

What does "unpublished work" mean? I assume the copyright in the README
is meant to apply to the aix.[ch] files based on it being the same
company name, and AIX.

Obviously the license only applies to AIX but I wonder if we should just
remove the files at some point and require an AIX user to reimplement
this. I see a mention of the copyright from 1999:

http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/1999-12/msg00747.php

and another in 2007:

http://archives.postgresql.org/pgsql-hackers/2007-03/msg01450.php

but no one seems to have noticed the README text.

I think this got missed because it starts out like a BSD license, then
has the "no profit" clause added:

Permission is granted to freely use, copy, modify, and redistribute
this software, provided that no attempt is made to gain profit from it,
the author is not construed to be liable for any results of using the
software, alterations are clearly marked as such, and this notice is
not modified.

Can someone contat the author company? I think this is them:

http://www.helios.de/

HELIOS Software GmbH
Steinriede 3
D-30827 Garbsen, Germany
Phone: +49 5131 709320

--
Bruce Momjian <bruce(at)momjian(dot)us> http://momjian.us
EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +

May, Randy wrote:
> PostGresQL Admin,
>
>
>
> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to be
> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal to
> connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:

Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?

--
Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.

That would be ideal, and it may come to that. Our Legal department gets
a little 'sticky' when we try to modify Open Source Software, so I'd
like to avoid that if I can.

____________________________________________________________________
Randy
-----Original Message-----
From: Alvaro Herrera [mailto:alvherre(at)commandprompt(dot)com]
Sent: Tuesday, April 21, 2009 11:54 AM
To: May, Randy
Cc: pgsql-hackers(at)postgresql(dot)org
Subject: Re: [ADMIN] License Issue

May, Randy wrote:
> PostGresQL Admin,
>
>
>
> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to be
> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal
to
> connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:

Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?

--
Alvaro Herrera
http://www.CommandPrompt.com/
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.

>> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
>> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to
>> be
>> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the
>> Portal to
>> connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
>> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:
>
> Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
> server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?

AIX itself now offers the functions found in src/backend/port/
dynloader/aix.c so I think that file may be obsolete as of (at least
AIX 5.3).

aix.c was required long ago because AIX did not offer the popular
dlopen(), dlsym(), dlclose(), and dlerror() functions - you had to
write them yourself.

-- Korry

Korry Douglas wrote:
>>> I am part of an organization that is beginning to write commercial
>>> applications for various Portals (Liferay, etc.). We would like to
>>> be
>>> able to deploy PostGresQL as the lightweight database for the Portal
>>> to
>>> connect to. Our request for approval to our Legal Department has
>>> stalled due to the following language in one of the files:
>>
>> Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
>> server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?
>
> AIX itself now offers the functions found in src/backend/port/
> dynloader/aix.c so I think that file may be obsolete as of (at least AIX
> 5.3).

It seems that AIX 5.2 will no longer be supported starting 30th april
this year, according to
http://www-01.ibm.com/software/support/systemsp/lifecycle/#GA

--
Alvaro Herrera http://www.CommandPrompt.com/
The PostgreSQL Company - Command Prompt, Inc.

Korry Douglas <korry(dot)douglas(at)enterprisedb(dot)com> writes:
>> Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
>> server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?

> AIX itself now offers the functions found in src/backend/port/
> dynloader/aix.c so I think that file may be obsolete as of (at least
> AIX 5.3).

> aix.c was required long ago because AIX did not offer the popular
> dlopen(), dlsym(), dlclose(), and dlerror() functions - you had to
> write them yourself.

Well, we've got AIXen in the buildfarm, shall we rip out those files
and see what happens?

regards, tom lane

tgl(at)sss(dot)pgh(dot)pa(dot)us (Tom Lane) writes:
> Korry Douglas <korry(dot)douglas(at)enterprisedb(dot)com> writes:
>>> Seems like the easy solution is to rip out the AIX files in your
>>> server deployments ... or are you actually intending to support AIX?
>
>> AIX itself now offers the functions found in src/backend/port/
>> dynloader/aix.c so I think that file may be obsolete as of (at least
>> AIX 5.3).
>
>> aix.c was required long ago because AIX did not offer the popular
>> dlopen(), dlsym(), dlclose(), and dlerror() functions - you had to
>> write them yourself.
>
> Well, we've got AIXen in the buildfarm, shall we rip out those files
> and see what happens?

Go nuts :-).

From "our" perspective (at Afilias), I wouldn't see any problem with
stripping out obsolete AIXisms like this, as long as we're validating
the change against buildfarm, which we're running regularly. We got
rid of our last AIX 5.1 a couple of years ago.

However, there have been some reports out there on the InterWeb of
people running PostgreSQL on AIX 4.3 and such, and those people might
be displeased by this stuff getting "ripped out."

But that being said, I can't see it being a particularly sensible to
be keeping PostgreSQL up to date on a platform where the OS has been
out of maintenance for *years*.
--
let name="cbbrowne" and tld="acm.org" in name ^ "@" ^ tld;;
http://linuxfinances.info/info/linuxdistributions.html
Rules of the Evil Overlord #151. "I will not set myself up as a
god. That perilous position is reserved for my trusted lieutenant."
<http://www.eviloverlord.com/>

I wrote:
> Well, we've got AIXen in the buildfarm, shall we rip out those files
> and see what happens?

On looking closer, the existing special AIX code is all a no-op anyway
if HAVE_DLOPEN is defined, and there is a comment there saying it's been
obsolete since AIX 4.3. So I think we're pretty safe in removing it,
which I have now done in HEAD.

regards, tom lane

Tom Lane wrote:
> I wrote:
> > Well, we've got AIXen in the buildfarm, shall we rip out those files
> > and see what happens?
>
> On looking closer, the existing special AIX code is all a no-op anyway
> if HAVE_DLOPEN is defined, and there is a comment there saying it's been
> obsolete since AIX 4.3. So I think we're pretty safe in removing it,
> which I have now done in HEAD.

I assume we don't want to adjust backports, but we still have the
license issue there.

--
Bruce Momjian <bruce(at)momjian(dot)us> http://momjian.us
EnterpriseDB http://enterprisedb.com

+ If your life is a hard drive, Christ can be your backup. +