Must Joomla Extensions all be GNU/GPL? Have your say.
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- Amy Stephen
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Andrew Eddie wrote:
I'm very concerned that by loosening the straps about which proprietary development can occur, that we allow for forces to enter that will pillage and swallow the project. The quip was made that Joomla! could become like a coral reef where all the fish have done. I will contend that the fish were eaten by sharks that enter through holes in a protecting outer rim that was where the GPL once firmly stood.
Lead on, as usual, MasterChief! Three cheers! Here's to *fully* liberating Joomla!
Thanks for all you have done for this community and for open source for years.
Amy
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- CG Icon
- Hero Rocketeer
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And Google is about the only firm that has the b@ll$ to go up against that large OS firm.........interesting
well I hope ya'll get this ironed out....... in the mean time..... I love the commercial add ons I have bought,, and I can never thank the open source community for giving me the tools to succeed for free.
my only complaints on commercial is though it was purchased, the support is spotty ....and the largest complaint is when they tie the plugin to a domain
good luck with all this fellow OS'ers
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- James Spencer
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As long as cool templates, awesome components still get made, I will be happy.
If you say everything is going to be ok, that is good enough for me
Cheers for the post
- James Spencer / Developer & Support / Hull, UK
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- Daniel Chapman
- Elite Rocketeer
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I myself am actually working on a commercial GPL extensions project in the making with several other developers. (part of my quietness on these forums lately) With similar intentions to yours.
I am doing it mainly because basically everything I know about Joomla I learned from reading other peoples GPL code.
I find it far easier to learn from code than from a manual so I did it this way.
So even when I develop something that is technically totally new, I still feel myself that I owe something to the community.
However I don't have an issue with others encrypting if that is what they wish. I sometimes get a little frustrated because I know I could fix something if I just had access to the code, but I would rather see these commercial products thrive so I can at least get them than have them die because they were forced to remove their encryption.
Incidently I even get annoyed at Andy sometimes for encrypting the Javascript he puts in the templates.
I could probably have fixed the positioning bug for Rokzoom days ago if it all wasn't all encrypted. So isnt it a little hypocritical don't you think to be preaching 'GPL profits for all' from the protected income of a non gpl template club?
Templates are a 'special case' is as I said above a distinction of convenience. Templates use the same functions and code, and are put into joomla in the same way as module bots and components. Why are they a special case? There is no logical reason for it that I can see that isn't simply because that would be guaranteed suicide for joomla.
Incidently, what is ijoomla magazine component but a more focussed portable template? It does nothing more than display content the same as a template does. What about my modules that do similar? (Even though they are already released GPL) What exactly is it that differentiates a template to be a special non GPL case?
I won't ever encrypt a piece of my code unless rampant piracy forces me to to protect my livelihood. But will instead focus on, as you say, offering so much value for money that people can't resist paying for it.
However not all components can fit that model.
Some are niche focussed and as such have a low sales turnover which requires a higher cost per unit. The higher the cost per unit the more likely people are to seek 'alternatives'. I.e. a hacked or warez version.
Or if it was a large scale project with infrequent releases ? Who would want to pay for a 'club' that only had releases every other month? When you could just go grab it off joomywarez.com
If code can't be protected then these components will quickly crumble and then who loses?
The community that wants to use those components. i.e. Joomla.
I would rather we didn't lose the niche components. I am sure everyone who uses them wouldn't either. Yes it would be fantastic if they were free, I would love to produce my code for free too and give to all and sundry, but at the end of the day people need to eat, and the current model that joomla has been using works very well for that.
Perhaps as Damo says a new license is needed.
At the very least a little more transparency from the core team about this process would be appreciated by everyone I am sure. All that is left is speculation and the frenzy that is the Death Thread.
Joomla - Open source matters (so much we keep what we are doing with it secret).
- Last Edit: 16 years 10 months ago by Daniel Chapman.
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www.ninjoomla.com
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- Andrew Eddie
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Andy can cover this better than I, but the template is considered in 2 parts as far as I understand.
The php source files are distributed under the GPL, that is, the files that interact with the Joomla! script as it's executed and compiled into memory by the server. All cool. But the other element to the template is the copyright of the artistic content - the actual "thing" that forms the pretty thing that you see in the browser including images, the placement thereof, colours, etc. It has a special name but it escapes me. But whatever it's called, it affects the rights of the user to use it. One is concerned with the rights of "distribution", the other is concerned with the rights of "use". That's the special case "I believe" but let Andy confirm that more because it's his thing.
Clear as mud? - Andrew Eddie
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- damo
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maybe that term is permissive licensing?
however its irrelevant on the grounds that OSM are happily distributing joomla using the GPL license and teh GPL license allows templates not to be 100% GPL (as in the entire package) - Last Edit: 16 years 10 months ago by damo.
- www.c3p0.se - sweden
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- Daniel Chapman
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Andrew: Still doesn't explain the encrypted Javascript.
If Andy encrypts the Javascript to protect his code doesn't that kind of prove the point about the need for encryption in some cases in order to keep a project alive? If Open Source is so cruicial to Joomla and so easy to survive with then why does he and other template companies encrypt theirs?
Out of curiousity does the mootools license (MIT) allow encryption of derived code? (I assume it must)
EDIT: Andy's JS compressed not encrypted and available to thoe who ask.
There are technical ways around the GPL and Joomla.
GPL allows programs using an API as opposed to core routines to be licensed differently. So if I want to encrypt my code I make a magic GPL api program to interpret the joomla core functions and feed data to my encrypted program.
Or I can make a stand alone product and bridge it into joomla.
Or is Joomla! going to start trying to force any product that is bridged to use GPL?
That could be interesting because then RT, the core team and the whole joomla community can kiss SMF goodbye because it isn't GPL. It would also mean the end of several other high profile non gpl programs that have been bridged into Joomla.
What about wrapped content? I could also use a wrapper and a bridge over my standalone program.
Or could I make a 'template' that has component level functionality built into it and encrypted? A super rokzoom and moomenu add on for example.
This still means these programs can be used in Joomla and not licensed GPL, but all it does is make it a pain for the developers and the users.
Has the core team really thought out the massive hit the extension directory is going to take by this? And the resulting fallout from people going elsewhere because they can no longer run their real estate site, community site, hotel site, government site (which uses a non GPL forms component, of which I know several sites doing this) , directory site, video site, e-magazine, Newsportal site etc. etc. etc. in joomla anymore without fear of legal action?
Some of the recent comparisons on these forums between Joomla and Drupal had some high profile Joomla sites listed as the 'showcase' for Joomla being used in big business and government.
Most of these sites use at least one non gpl component! So Joomla is going to ensure it's survival by cutting off it's most high profile sites? That is madness. - Last Edit: 16 years 10 months ago by Daniel Chapman.
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- V-man
- Sr. Rocketeer
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Andy Miller wrote:
...gpl doesn't mean you can't charge for you extensions ...
I take Andy at his word. However, his comments do not address the encryption issue, which is important to some. Looking forward to that official statement for clarification.
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- Andy Miller
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- Web Kahuna
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Just want to point out that changing a license from gpl to something else requires the approval of all commiters to the joomla codebase, and because the codebase was forked from mambo, all mambo commiters too. Even something like adding a rider, needs to go through the same approval process. Not to say this is impossible, it's just really really really hard
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