[Trauer Andreas <andreas.trauer@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

 this is such a long discussion and it probably won't find and end. 
 I consider the time and costs of the procedure mentioned by Ronnie as
too high to really change the licence.

 So as Brad Hards had written before: Trying the other way might be
easier. Let's define some kind of "external" protocol, maybe by sending
messages through a pipe or whatsoever. This protocol has a server and a
client side. The client side is put under the GPL and included into the
Ethereal code. The server side has a licence that gives more rights to 
the user and can be implemented in closed sources. The protocol dissector
provides the service to decode a binary message. Thus it needs to get 
the packet and returns an interpreted form of the message.

 The client could search a special directory for any plugins, load them 
and connect to them at runtime. In the beginning there could be a simple 
hello mechanism exchanging the version of the transfer protocol, thus 
allowing improvements to the protocol and keeping backward compatibility 
through fallback. The client can propagate the found dissectors in the 
Ethereal.

When the Ethereal needs to dissect an external protocol it could send
kind of a "dissect request" with the binary message through the client.
The "dissect response" could contain the decoded lines together with 
information to which offsets of the packet the lines belong to and 
some tree information. It would be the work of the client to fill the 
internal ethereal structures. These structures are part of the GPL code 
and cannot be used in the server side. 

It could start simple with improvements added later.

Comments?


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Ronnie Sahlberg [mailto:ronnie_sahlberg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> Sent: Friday, November 22, 2002 9:26 AM
> To: Joerg Mayer; ethereal-dev@xxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: Re: [Ethereal-dev] License change for plugins: Next steps
> 
> 
> Good list.
> 
> I would like to expand on it,
> I belive that in order to change the licence one would need 
> to do something
> like:
> 
> 1) identify the goals.
> 
> 2) produce a new licence with very clearly defined exceptions on what
> is allowed and what is not allowed.
> Get proper legal advise to verify that the new licence is actually
> enforceable adn does not contain
> loop-holes.  Well, one could argue that GPL has not been 
> verified either but
> it is the best we have
> right now.
> 
> 3) with proper legal advise, analyze all risks with changing 
> the licence
> according to 2), that is
> what loop-holes may be present.
> Do a proper risk analysis.
> Also analyse or provide information covering the risks that 
> the ethereal
> developers take:
>  IF the license is changed in such a way that sometime down the road a
> loop-hole is found and abused
> WHO is liable to compensate the developers for their unpaid work or
> dissapointment IF such an extension is abused?
> Will someone be prepared to come out two years from now and 
> say, sorry guys
> that the licence change
> we requested from you had this effect in case something bad happens?
> OK, GPL is risky in this regard as well but it is the best we 
> have today.
> 
> 4) discuss the licence produced in 3).  Note, all work in 
> steps 1 to 3 can
> be made completely off list.
> Present the result from 3) to the list and seek acceptance.
> If acceptance can not be acheived go back to 1)
> 
> 5) Track down every single contributor to ethereal and get 
> them to either
> agree or refuse the proposed change.
> For every single contributor that does not approve of the license an
> analysis must be made describing
> every single contribution by that contributor. (This includes 
> also everyone
> that can not be reached or tracked, Copyright of a work does 
> not just cease
> because you can not find the copyright holder)
> 
> 6) Replace every contribution from developers that has not 
> approved the
> change.
> Or if this is too much work, go back to 1 and try again.
> 
> 7) finished.
> 
> 
> 
> 1 probably takes a little time.
> 2 and 3 probably costs a lot of money since legal advise is required.
> 3 contains an insurance that probably costs a lot of money if 
> someone is to
> offer to be responsible to reimbruise all the developers if 
> the licence
> change results in something bad.
> 4, can be discussed on the list.
> 5 and 6 will take a LOT of time and may require rewrites of 
> large parts of
> ethereal.
> 
> 
> Who is going to cover the monetary costs? Especially 2 and 3 
> is probably
> going to be expensive.
> Who will take responsibility in case the new license is broken?
> Who will contribute the potentially significant rewrite in 5-6 ?
> 
> The answer to the three questions above is in my case : not I
> 
> 
> I think it is difficult enough at this point that it is not 
> realistic to do
> a license change ever.
> 
> 
> I do NOT agree with the "consensus among the current 
> developers" is enough
> to change the license.
> IANAL but I really do think that one can not have like a 
> consensus vote to
> change someone elses copyright.
> Copyrights are valid until x years after an original authors death
> (estimated or confirmed?).
> I really dont think just because I can not get hold of the author of a
> certain work that I then can decide
> that his copyright and license can be changed.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Joerg Mayer"
> Sent: Friday, November 22, 2002 11:27 AM
> Subject: [Ethereal-dev] License change for plugins: Next steps
> 
> 
> 1) Identify the goals
> 2) Write a proposed addendum to the License
> 3) Discuss it
> 4) goto 2)
> 5) Write to all the people in the AUTHORS file and ask for consent
>    (with some introdution as to the why)
> 
> Corrections, additions, some writeup of 1 and maybe 2 are encouraged.
> 
> 
> 
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