[Python-Dev] Incorporating bsddb3

[Guido van Rossum]

> > What's the license on the BerkeleyDB code from Sleepycat?  
> 
> There are two licenses: One that they call the "open source license",
> see
> 
> http://www.sleepycat.com/license.net
> 
> There is also a commercial license.
> 
> > Can we legally distribute RPMs or other binaries containing it?  (I
> > thought there were some restrictions that make it not open source.)
> 
> It depends. This is the condition:
> 
> # Redistributions in any form must be accompanied by information on
> # how to obtain complete source code for the DB software and any
> # accompanying software that uses the DB software.  The source code
> # must either be included in the distribution or be available for no
> # more than the cost of distribution plus a nominal fee, and must be
> # freely redistributable under reasonable conditions.
> 
> So distributing Python itself should be no problem.

It's similar to GPL's "copyleft".  I think it's no different from what
we do with e.g. GNU readline, so I think it's okay.  Redistributors of
Python in binary form will have to beware though.  I wonder if we're
on thin ice with the RPMs (since we don't clarify any of this)?

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)