Re: [SciPy-Dev] cubature license (Warren Weckesser)
Dear all, due to the BSD and GPL licenses incompatibilities the cubature package will not be included in SciPy. Steven Johnson replied explaining that the code is directly derived from Hintlib, and GNU GSL libraries, both of which are GPL. The wrapper is already available in GitHub and soon I will include one link in PyPI. https://github.com/saullocastro/cubature if anyone is interested. Greetings, Saullo 2013/8/25 <scipy-dev-request@scipy.org>
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: cubature license (Warren Weckesser)
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Message: 1 Date: Sun, 25 Aug 2013 08:01:32 -0400 From: Warren Weckesser <warren.weckesser@gmail.com> Subject: Re: [SciPy-Dev] cubature license To: SciPy Developers List <scipy-dev@scipy.org> Message-ID: < CAGzF1udYnngzyzjS2ezp2h3joYkzLib9jXiZSKpjSZSPz3RHhw@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
On 8/25/13, Saullo Castro <saullogiovani@gmail.com> wrote:
@Warren
from the good disccusion here ( http://matplotlib.org/devel/license.html#license-discussion) it seems that the biggest difference between the GPL and the BSD is that the former requires you to distribute your source code, and the BSD allows you to do whatever you want...
I don't see the problem to include it in SciPy, since the source code is always distributed.
The issue is the restriction placed on anyone who wants to *redistribute* software that uses scipy. For example, currently a third party could build and sell a commercial application that uses scipy without having to distribute the source code for the application or their modified version of scipy. That would not be possible with a GPL license.
More reading: http://www.freebsd.org/doc/en/articles/bsdl-gpl/article.html
Warren
Even if third part companies like Enthought are using it, it is more like a module, isn't it? and the core code behind it can still be BSD based.
Anyway, the software has a `clencurt_gen.c` stand-alone program which does not have to be used unless the user whant a `p-adaptive` cubature with more than 8193 points per dimension, this type of cubature applies "p-refinement" (increase of interpolation function order) instead of "h-refinement" (splitting the interval). I don't see a need to include this program in the SciPy cubature. We can implement this restriction in the wrapper.
I will ask Steven Johnson about this, if removing this part could make cubature re-licensable to BSD.
Greetings! Saullo
2013/8/24 <scipy-dev-request@scipy.org>
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Today's Topics:
1. Re: cubature license (Robert Kern) 2. Re: cubature license (Warren Weckesser) 3. Re: cubature license (Warren Weckesser)
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Message: 1 Date: Sat, 24 Aug 2013 16:53:10 +0200 From: Robert Kern <robert.kern@gmail.com> Subject: Re: [SciPy-Dev] cubature license To: SciPy Developers List <scipy-dev@scipy.org> Message-ID: < CAF6FJivScnjqnAZO8OJ0XZpJ48+KsC5rdOmE+5z-EWWJn7iH_g@mail.gmail.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
On Sat, Aug 24, 2013 at 4:47 PM, Warren Weckesser < warren.weckesser@gmail.com> wrote:
On 8/24/13, Saullo Castro <saullogiovani@gmail.com> wrote:
@Alex,
you are right, "it uses some GPL code from other projects (Hintlib and GSL). "
But is it really impossible to include it in SciPy because of that?
Yes. We do not include GPL-licensed code in SciPy. I haven't looked at the Cubature code, so I don't know the extent to which it uses HIntLib and GSL, but based on the comment on the web page, it is unlikely that Steven Johnson can re-license his code with a license that is compatible with SciPy. The GPL is viral that way (insert the usual "I am not a lawyer" disclaimer here).
It's not quite as viral as that. He can license the code that he himself wrote under whatever license he likes as long as it is compatible with the GPL license of the other libraries that he is combining his code with. If the code that he wrote is separable from HIntLib and GSL by rewriting that functionality, he can distribute his code under the BSD license for inclusion in SciPy.
-- Robert Kern
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Saullo Castro