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| <h2>Spotlight: On Developers |
| and Technology</h2> |
| <p>23 July 2001</p><br> |
| <p>On Licensing. This discussion <a href="//www-discuss/current/msg04262.html" target="_blank">began |
| </a>with a simple desire: a grammar checker in OpenOffice.org. In phrasing the |
| desire, the community member raised the question about the interoperation of |
| Free Software licenses, specifically, the GPL, or <a href="http://www.fsf.org/copyleft/gpl.html" target="_blank">GNU |
| General Public License</a>. OpenOffice.org code is <a href="//license.html" target="_blank">licensed |
| </a>under the <a href="http://www.fsf.org/graphics/philosophicalgnu.html" target="_blank">GNU |
| Lesser General Public License (LGPL)</a> and the <a href="//licenses/sissl_license.html" target="_blank">Sun |
| Industry Standards Source License (SISSL)</a>. The difference in licensing makes |
| for some incompatibility. To forestall confusion, Michelle Milledge, one of |
| OpenOffice.org's community managers, proposed a <a href="//www-discuss/current/msg04321.html" target="_blank">FAQ</a> |
| that would clarify the distinctions between the two licenses. Immediately, community |
| members such as <a href="//www-discuss/current/msg04313.html" target="_blank">Gianluca |
| Turconi</a> and <a href="//www-discuss/current/msg04338.html" target="_blank">Gary |
| Edwards,</a> among many others, presented carefully reasoned arguments on the |
| licenses and what they mean, philosophically and practically. </p> |
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