MySQL client libraries licensing (was Fedora Core 2 wishlists)

[Nils O. Selåsdal]

On Wed, 2003-12-10 at 09:12, Yovko Lambrev wrote:
> Warren Togami wrote:
>  > We really need to have an auto-responder that searches for certain
>  > strings like this...
> 
> Sorry, Warren it won't work if the problem still exist. I don't want to
> argue but I cannot agree so easy. With all my respect to you and Mr. Cox.
> 
> I believe that this new Fedora community is much more open than the
> RedHat's one! I have been an user, fan and admin of the old RedHat Linux
> for more than 7 years and I feel myself closely enough to all the
> RedHat's issues, problems, feelings... Usually I'm here reading... I am
> not core developer till now here but I feel Fedora/RedHat like my kind
> of distribution. I have been an user and admin of MySQL for more than
> 2-3 years also and I feel it like my kind of database and my kind of
> open community.
> 
> I knew about the problem you mentioned but I still don't know the
> Fedora's solution... SuSE and Debian already has their solutions. To
> throw out of the box MySQL 4.x is not the solution at all!
> 
> Let's go through the facts:
> MySQL 3.x client libraries - LGPL
> MySQL 4.x client libraries - GPL (whole MySQL 4 is GPL)
> PHP license is not GPL (it is much more BSD-like)

> Fedora Core is GPL. All the software in Fedora Core 1 is GPL
No, not at all. There are a wide varity of licenses in Fedora.


> So...?
> We cannot put MySQL 4.x in Fedora collection because it is GPL but we
> will allow PHP which is not?!! Let's throw out the kernel also!? I just
> can't agree...
It is not only about MySQL being GPL.
Its about the mysql license beeing incompatible with projects that link
to its libraries.
One solution is to just throw mysql out of PHP. It may move someone
over to PostgreSQL, which is a good thing ;)

> Let's find a real solution... As far as I know there is no contacts
> between Fedora/RedHat community and MySQL developers. Why? I will inform
> about this issue a few of my friends from MySQL and will ask them for
> help. I think this is the right way to find a solution. I will write to
> Mr. Zak Greant also - he is ex-PHP and current MySQL community advocate
> - very friendly and helpful guy and will ask him for advice.
Would be nice. People elsewhere ought to be aware of this. What
do other distros do ?

-- 
Vennlig hilsen/Best Regards
Nils Olav Selåsdal
System Engineer
UtelSystems a/s

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