Plone Licensing FAQ
The next CMS for which translation of licensing reference material is ready is Plone . On Habré about her also was discussed earlier (see, for example, here ). It, like many other systems, is distributed under the terms of the free GPL license. This help may be inferior in its volume to other similar materials about licensing specific CMS (for example, about the same Drupal ), but it is still a good example of how product developers explain to their users (including potential ones) its details. licensing.
This document answers some general questions about Plone, its licensing policy, and the operation of the GPL license. The contributor agreement and the GPL license remain official sources (for example, everything we write here is not covered by these documents), but this document is useful for reading if you have questions about Plone and its license and you do not want to read legal documents for obtaining answers to some simple questions.
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What is the GPL?
The GPL (GNU Public License) license, under which Plone is distributed, governs what you can and cannot do with the Plone code. In a nutshell, she says that you should post any changes you make to the code and give them to the Plone community if you are distributing Plone. Although there are a number of additional questions arising from this, we have tried to present in this document the answers to most of them.
What version of the GPL is used?
For Plone, the GPL version 2 license is used. As of summer 2009 1, there are no active plans to upgrade to the updated GPL version 3 license.
Where can I find the text of the GPL?
It is available at gnu.org .
Will Plone charge money from its customers or developers in the future?
Not. If the Foundation offers a version of Plone that is not under the terms of the GPL, then versions of Plone will be available under commercial licenses, but they will be separate products from those you are currently using. A company can choose a Plone source code license and sell it as a separate product, but the Plone that you are using now will always be available under a free license.
Is Plone available under dual license?
Currently, Plone is not available under licenses other than the GPL, and has never been available. As of May 2009, the Plone Foundation adopted a policy according to which you can choose to re-license a limited number * of module components of the * Plone framework under a modified BSD license in order to facilitate the use of such modules by developers outside of Plone. This does not affect the overall licensing status of Plone. See our Framework Component Reclamation Policy: plone.org/foundation/materials/foundation-resolutions/plone-framework-components-relicensing-policy for more information about this policy.
Are there differences between licenses and costs when using Plone on commercial or non-commercial terms?
[Cm. above about the current status of dual licensing] No. Plone is only available under the GPL. We do not distinguish between commercial and non-commercial use.
Will I be charged for installing updates for the current version of Plone?
Not.
When developers provide source code to the Plone community, will the Plone Foundation in the future include such code in commercial releases of Plone?
If it is flagged in Plone SVN (not in Collective) as a change to Plone itself, both the Plone Foundation and the developer will have full rights to that piece of code. Therefore, if the Plone Foundation is licensing Plone under a commercial license, this code will be part of the software package.
To become a Plone contributor, you must sign a Plone Contributor Agreement, whereby you transfer the copyright to your code to the Plone Foundation. All code owned by the Plone Foundation is published under the terms of the GPL license, with the exception of some of the libraries published under the BSD license as described above. So yes, if you are submitting a new package to the Plone core code repository, you must submit it under a GPL license. You, as the author of the code, do not choose under which license you publish the code.
Should add-ons for Plone be licensed under the GPL?
In most cases, yes. The GPL license covers any Plone "derivative works" and defines such derivative works as those that:
The vast majority of add-ons are one or both of the above examples, and are thus licensed under the GPL. It is acceptable to create an add-on that is not one of these examples (many common Zope products are not specialized for Plone, like some Plone topics). Such products are not required to be licensed under the GPL.
Should Plone themes be licensed under the GPL?
Yes, if the theme is created from code licensed under the GPL. See “Plone Licensing Policy for Plone”: plone.org/foundation/materials/foundation-resolutions/plone-framework-components-relicensing-policy for more information.
Why aren't you using the LGPL?
The GPL is well understood by many companies because of Linux and more closely matches our goals than the LGPL.
Can the Plone Foundation fund change a Plone license to (for example) a BSD license?
Yes. However, the current published code will always remain under the GPL. If we still decide to change the license, for example, the BSD license or the Apache license, we will probably have parallel licenses, so you can use the one that best suits your needs. Even if we decide to change the GPL to BSD, the GPL version will remain available and under development.
I made a corporate intranet and made some changes to the Plone core, which contains confidential information. Should I post it in public?
Not. As long as you do not distribute the code (for example, you sell it as your product or distribute it outside your company), you can keep the changes you made in Plone. Although, of course, we are grateful for contributions and bug fixes. :)
Will I lose the rights to the code for which I make a contribution to Plone?
Not at all. You have every right to do anything with such a code fragment, and the Plone Foundation has the full right to modify such code as part of the Plone code.
So why I can not take Plone, change it a little, modify the source code and sell as my own product?
You can. Nothing in the GPL prohibits you from reselling Plone as long as you comply: you must fully provide the source code for Plone and the changes you have made, as well as any additions. In addition, you must license your product under the terms of a GPL-compatible license and you cannot use the Plone name for any modified product - “Plone” is a registered trademark. Therefore, you can sell your own version of Plone: you just cannot do it under a non-GPL-compatible license and call your product "Plone".
What about the responsibility for checking the code for Plone in the text of a contributor agreement?
You are responsible for not verifying the code that is subject to copyright - we must take this precaution, because we do not have the resources to check the code’s contributions from each. This does not mean that we will sue you for the reason that your code contains bugs.
I suspect that X is promoting and selling Plone as its own system or using Plone code in its product without contributing to the community. What should I do?
Please write a letter to the management of the foundation with details of where you found the product and why you think that it uses the Plone code. We will contact the company, and if they violate the GPL, we will provide information to our lawyers.
I have additional questions that are not answered in this FAQ.
Feedback and additions to this document should be sent to the management of the fund , and this document will be updated accordingly.
Note per.
_____________
approx. per. - My other CMS licensing translations:
This document answers some general questions about Plone, its licensing policy, and the operation of the GPL license. The contributor agreement and the GPL license remain official sources (for example, everything we write here is not covered by these documents), but this document is useful for reading if you have questions about Plone and its license and you do not want to read legal documents for obtaining answers to some simple questions.
')
What is the GPL?
The GPL (GNU Public License) license, under which Plone is distributed, governs what you can and cannot do with the Plone code. In a nutshell, she says that you should post any changes you make to the code and give them to the Plone community if you are distributing Plone. Although there are a number of additional questions arising from this, we have tried to present in this document the answers to most of them.
What version of the GPL is used?
For Plone, the GPL version 2 license is used. As of summer 2009 1, there are no active plans to upgrade to the updated GPL version 3 license.
Where can I find the text of the GPL?
It is available at gnu.org .
Will Plone charge money from its customers or developers in the future?
Not. If the Foundation offers a version of Plone that is not under the terms of the GPL, then versions of Plone will be available under commercial licenses, but they will be separate products from those you are currently using. A company can choose a Plone source code license and sell it as a separate product, but the Plone that you are using now will always be available under a free license.
Is Plone available under dual license?
Currently, Plone is not available under licenses other than the GPL, and has never been available. As of May 2009, the Plone Foundation adopted a policy according to which you can choose to re-license a limited number * of module components of the * Plone framework under a modified BSD license in order to facilitate the use of such modules by developers outside of Plone. This does not affect the overall licensing status of Plone. See our Framework Component Reclamation Policy: plone.org/foundation/materials/foundation-resolutions/plone-framework-components-relicensing-policy for more information about this policy.
Are there differences between licenses and costs when using Plone on commercial or non-commercial terms?
[Cm. above about the current status of dual licensing] No. Plone is only available under the GPL. We do not distinguish between commercial and non-commercial use.
Will I be charged for installing updates for the current version of Plone?
Not.
When developers provide source code to the Plone community, will the Plone Foundation in the future include such code in commercial releases of Plone?
If it is flagged in Plone SVN (not in Collective) as a change to Plone itself, both the Plone Foundation and the developer will have full rights to that piece of code. Therefore, if the Plone Foundation is licensing Plone under a commercial license, this code will be part of the software package.
Should I provide code in Plone under the GPL?
To become a Plone contributor, you must sign a Plone Contributor Agreement, whereby you transfer the copyright to your code to the Plone Foundation. All code owned by the Plone Foundation is published under the terms of the GPL license, with the exception of some of the libraries published under the BSD license as described above. So yes, if you are submitting a new package to the Plone core code repository, you must submit it under a GPL license. You, as the author of the code, do not choose under which license you publish the code.
Should add-ons for Plone be licensed under the GPL?
In most cases, yes. The GPL license covers any Plone "derivative works" and defines such derivative works as those that:
- copied or modified from the code we provided to you (including Python code, HTML, images, etc.)
- Linked to our GPL-code in Python (for example, by using import in Python)
The vast majority of add-ons are one or both of the above examples, and are thus licensed under the GPL. It is acceptable to create an add-on that is not one of these examples (many common Zope products are not specialized for Plone, like some Plone topics). Such products are not required to be licensed under the GPL.
Should Plone themes be licensed under the GPL?
Yes, if the theme is created from code licensed under the GPL. See “Plone Licensing Policy for Plone”: plone.org/foundation/materials/foundation-resolutions/plone-framework-components-relicensing-policy for more information.
Why aren't you using the LGPL?
The GPL is well understood by many companies because of Linux and more closely matches our goals than the LGPL.
Can the Plone Foundation fund change a Plone license to (for example) a BSD license?
Yes. However, the current published code will always remain under the GPL. If we still decide to change the license, for example, the BSD license or the Apache license, we will probably have parallel licenses, so you can use the one that best suits your needs. Even if we decide to change the GPL to BSD, the GPL version will remain available and under development.
I made a corporate intranet and made some changes to the Plone core, which contains confidential information. Should I post it in public?
Not. As long as you do not distribute the code (for example, you sell it as your product or distribute it outside your company), you can keep the changes you made in Plone. Although, of course, we are grateful for contributions and bug fixes. :)
Will I lose the rights to the code for which I make a contribution to Plone?
Not at all. You have every right to do anything with such a code fragment, and the Plone Foundation has the full right to modify such code as part of the Plone code.
So why I can not take Plone, change it a little, modify the source code and sell as my own product?
You can. Nothing in the GPL prohibits you from reselling Plone as long as you comply: you must fully provide the source code for Plone and the changes you have made, as well as any additions. In addition, you must license your product under the terms of a GPL-compatible license and you cannot use the Plone name for any modified product - “Plone” is a registered trademark. Therefore, you can sell your own version of Plone: you just cannot do it under a non-GPL-compatible license and call your product "Plone".
What about the responsibility for checking the code for Plone in the text of a contributor agreement?
You are responsible for not verifying the code that is subject to copyright - we must take this precaution, because we do not have the resources to check the code’s contributions from each. This does not mean that we will sue you for the reason that your code contains bugs.
I suspect that X is promoting and selling Plone as its own system or using Plone code in its product without contributing to the community. What should I do?
Please write a letter to the management of the foundation with details of where you found the product and why you think that it uses the Plone code. We will contact the company, and if they violate the GPL, we will provide information to our lawyers.
I have additional questions that are not answered in this FAQ.
Feedback and additions to this document should be sent to the management of the fund , and this document will be updated accordingly.
Note per.
- ↑ Apparently, this FAQ was first published in the summer of 2009.
_____________
approx. per. - My other CMS licensing translations:
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/302116/
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