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0 pointsmattsah13y ago0 comments

Let me clarify, I don't think anyone's projects that are web facing actually use their testing library to perform the tasks. So for all intents and purposes their projects as they are "distributed" over a network are not linking to it even though it may exist in their source tree.

The only exception to this would be if the project is actually for testing, like say an online service that tests your code.

Also any private non-distributed use does not require source distribution.

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RyanZAG13y ago· 3 in thread

Why is it AGPL then and not GPL? This seems to just create a minefield in the strange event when some test function needs to be exposed to the public for some reason. While this probably won't occur, if it does, suddenly the whole source needs to be released.

There does not seem to be any benefit to making this AGPL as it as the source release on use feature of AGPL is not intended to be used during regular usage.

Change it to GPL - it makes no practical difference, yet increases potential usage of the library at no cost.

mattsahOP13y ago

GPL only applies to binary software. PHP is not compiled and linked.

0x013y ago

That sounds like a very dangerous opinion to present as if it were a fact.

Is it not more a matter of whether a piece of software is a "derivative" of the GPL software?

Looks like even the FSF does not have a clear black&white answer to this question: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#MereAggregation: "if the semantics of the communication are intimate enough, exchanging complex internal data structures, that too could be a basis to consider the two parts as combined into a larger program"

I remember the mysql guys used to claim that any software connecting to a mysql server would be "infected" with GPL, at least if it was written to depend on the official mysql client libraries, even if the software in question didn't actually copy a single character from any mysql distributions. (?)

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RyanZAG13y ago

You're correct...

I find this completely insane though! Everything is just 0s and 1s that are transformed and ultimately can be passed through the logic gates on a CPU to do math. Whether code is compiled or interpreted has no effect on the end goal - such as an instruction to the CPU to add two numbers.

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