[sword-devel] Script to find a best fit v11n

[Greg Hellings]

I think this sentiment from Peter is the crux of why people in this
community don't want to use a more permissive license. Most of us don't
want our work on scripture, scripture access, and the surrounding utilities
to be turned into a commercial application. That's exactly what Copyleft
licenses try to ensure. This isn't the case of a compression library, or an
encryption algorithm which, while good, is just a too. Most of us view this
as far more than that, and we do not want to see it turned into a way to
restrict access to scripture. So I don't think the more permissive option
is going to go very far.

But a less permissive option to use GPLv2 or GPLv3? That would be great!
(At least, in a self-serving way, it would be great for me)

--Greg

On Mon, Jun 30, 2025 at 11:46 AM Peter von Kaehne <refdoc at gmx.net> wrote:

> Fair. Still my view. Did not know they are niw separate. It started thiugh
> as one and the basic decisions were made when one was part of the other.
>
> Having access to all our modules and using the labour of everyone and then
> creating a separate ecosystem with special modules we can not use is in my
> eyes very bad behaviour.
>
> It might be acceptable from the license point of view, it is not
> acceptable to me from any other point of view.
>
> Peter
>
> Sent from Outlook for iOS <https://aka.ms/o0ukef>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* sword-devel <sword-devel-bounces at crosswire.org> on behalf of
> David Haslam <dfhdfh at protonmail.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, June 30, 2025 2:57 pm
> *To:* sword-devel mailing list <sword-devel at crosswire.org>
> *Cc:* David Instone-Brewer <davidinstonebrewer at gmail.com>; Jamie Jamieson
> <jamie at critos.co.uk>
> *Subject:* Re: [sword-devel] Script to find a best fit v11n
>
> Hi Peter,
>
> STEP Bible is formally & organisationally separate from Tyndale House,
> Cambridge.
>
> It has been so for several years.
>
> David
>
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 30, 2025 at 14:52, Peter von Kaehne <refdoc at gmx.net
> <On+Mon,+Jun+30,+2025+at+14:52,+Peter+von+Kaehne+%3C%3Ca+href=>> wrote:
>
> Step Bible is to my mind the reason not ever to go LGPL. The sole reason
> STEP has the ESV and a dozen other modules we don’t have for us is a weird
> double encryption inside STEP we do not have access to. And Tyndale House
> behaves badly in terms of negotiating on everyone’s behalf. my view.
>
> Peter
>
> Sent from Outlook for iOS <https://aka.ms/o0ukef>
>
> ------------------------------
> *From:* sword-devel <sword-devel-bounces at crosswire.org> on behalf of
> David Haslam <dfhdfh at protonmail.com>
> *Sent:* Monday, June 30, 2025 2:40 pm
> *To:* sword-devel mailing list <sword-devel at crosswire.org>
> *Subject:* Re: [sword-devel] Script to find a best fit v11n
>
> Does anyone know whether STEP Bible uses JSword as is, or a modified form
> of JSword ?
>
> Asking in view of Arnaud’s observation about LGPL.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> David
>
> Sent from Proton Mail <https://proton.me/mail/home> for iOS
>
>
> On Mon, Jun 30, 2025 at 14:32, Arnaud Vié < unas.zole+avie at gmail.com
> <On+Mon,+Jun+30,+2025+at+14:32,+Arnaud+Vié+%3C%3Ca+href=>> wrote:
>
> It might be a silly question, but can't we just consider changing the
> libsword license to something more permissive to allow such use cases,
> without overthinking about GPL compatibility issues ?
> It is quite uncommon for open source libraries to use GPL nowadays, as
> it's very restrictive by nature. GPL remains mostly for "complete"
> applications - libraries tend to rather use LGPL, Apache 2.0 or MIT license
> (depending on the level of protection they seek), to favour wide usability.
>
> It is to be noted that JSword is published under LGPL, which allows other
> apps to use it without constraints as long as it's not being modified.
> It would be enough for the current use case, and it would make sense for
> libsword and jsword to be aligned.
> Personally speaking, I'd favour something more permissive like the Apache
> 2.0 license, which basically allows any usage or modification of any kind,
> but requires people to preserve the initial copyright notice and notify of
> significant changes.
>
> Of course, publishing under a new license can only be done by the current
> rights holder, which according to the libsword LICENSE is the "CrossWire
> Bible Society", as an organisation.
> Does Troy have the full power of decision on the topic ?
> Troy, what do you think of publishing libsword under a more permissive
> license ?
>
> Regards,
>
> Arnaud
>
>
> Le lun. 30 juin 2025 à 14:43, Matěj Cepl < mcepl at cepl.eu> a écrit :
>
> On Mon Jun 30, 2025 at 4:55 AM CEST, Aaron Rainbolt wrote:
> > From what I understand as someone who isn't a lawyer but has done
> > licensing audits for applications in Ubuntu and Debian, you'll only
> > run into issues if you publish *built binaries* of your code.
>
> That technically may be true, but it is a stupid idea. You don’t
> do open source software, which nobody can package and distribute.
>
> And apparently FSF doesn’t agree with my analysis:
> https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#v2v3Compatibility
>
> So, my only advice is to relicense your new program under GPLv2
> and send FSF to … Apparently, you will be in the distinguished
> company of Linus Torvalds and many others.
>
> Best,
>
> Matěj
>
> --
> http://matej.ceplovi.cz/blog/, @mcepl at en.osm.town
> GPG Finger: 3C76 A027 CA45 AD70 98B5  BC1D 7920 5802 880B C9D8
>
> For those of you who think we are descendents from those cavemen
> who stood and fought with dinosaurs, you must be nuts, we are
> descendents from the ones who ran like hell to live.
>
> _______________________________________________
> sword-devel mailing list: sword-devel at crosswire.org
> http://crosswire.org/mailman/listinfo/sword-devel
> Instructions to unsubscribe/change your settings at above page
>
> _______________________________________________
> sword-devel mailing list: sword-devel at crosswire.org
> http://crosswire.org/mailman/listinfo/sword-devel
> Instructions to unsubscribe/change your settings at above page
>
> _______________________________________________
> sword-devel mailing list: sword-devel at crosswire.org
> http://crosswire.org/mailman/listinfo/sword-devel
> Instructions to unsubscribe/change your settings at above page
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://crosswire.org/pipermail/sword-devel/attachments/20250630/c75c3bfe/attachment-0001.htm>