Need clarification on the license

First: calm down, read the GPL, read some stuff about the GPL, and try to understand the situation. Use your own brain rather than relying on everyone else to answer your questions for you. And don't panic.

It may be true that all modules and themes must be GPL if they are released at all. It also might be that they must only be GPL-compatible.

It is abundantly clear, however, that if some piece of code is used only on a small number of sites and not publicly available, it need not be GPL. The GPL only takes effect when code is distributed.

As someone with expertise in software licensing is much better able to give you a definitive answer.

However, the GNU GPL FAQ seems to make it very clear that if you're writing a piece of software that utilizes a GPLed library, the resulting software, if it is distributed, must also be GPLed. Such is the case with Drupal modules, which will not run independently of Drupal, and could be said of themes too although that's a greyer area (for the most part, themes are just HTML/CSS which could work anywhere).

GPLed software doesn't mean you can't charge for it, however. Only that it must be "free" as in freedom. This is also covered by the GPL FAQ. Though it's a long document, it contains very plain language to cover almost every scenario you can think of regarding GPLed software, so I'd recommend reading it, it should be able to answer your questions.

You also seem to be unfairly attacking Gerhard here. I don't see anything in his e-mail that constitutes as 'threatening' -- merely stated points directly from the GPL FAQ itself. It is your own responsibility to do homework on a software license prior to developing for an application covered by it -- don't shoot the messenger who tells you the way it works. If anyone is acting unethically here, I would point to the person who publishes private e-mails without the author's consent. :\

The only set point is that code distributed in Drupal CVS must be GPL -- there are currently no structures in place to handle code which is licensed under other terms. This is in part a limitation of the project system, and in part a desire to avoid licensing issues with any code hosted here. You are free to release code under other licenses, it just can't be hosted here.

Gerhard is a core contributor who strongly believes in the GPL. His belief is that all modules must be GPL if distributed -- both the interpretation of the GPL and other opinion is split on this. We have had advice in both directions, and I believe even with legal council this will not be resolved. Gerhard tends to word things quite strongly and is German like me, so I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he did not mean for his tone to be threatening.

Themes are a separate issue, since they contain graphics, HTML, CSS, etc. which are not considered "code".

I, for one, would like to have a wider statement from the Drupal community that in fact we do support differently licensed modules (like Joomla and other systems), but this is a strong point of contention.

Lekei, you mentioned a couple of times some connection between the GPL licensing and the software being written in PHP. I'm a bit confused here. What does the programming language have to do with the license for sotware written in that languge?

I am not a lawyer.

First, let's remove a lot of complexity.

• "cat" is a GPL'd piece of software from the FSF.
• "cat filename.txt" is how you use that piece of software.
• By using "cat", filename.txt IS NOT forced to GPL.

This logic is evidenced by from this bit of GNU FAQ:

Is there some way that I can GPL the output people get from use of my program? For example, if my program is used to develop hardware designs, can I require that these designs must be free? In general this is legally impossible; copyright law does not give you any say in the use of the output people make from their data using your program. If the user uses your program to enter or convert his own data, the copyright on the output belongs to him, not you. More generally, when a program translates its input into some other form, the copyright status of the output inherits that of the input it was generated from.

So here, "filename.txt", which contains all our user data, can never be forced under the GPL JUST BY USING THE "cat" PROGRAM. The key sentence here is "copyright law does not give you any say in the use of the output". Keep that in mind.

Now, let's go back to Drupal templates. The templates handle the OUTPUT of YOUR data in YOUR database. Use of Drupal, a GPL'd program just like "cat", can not copyright the output of the templates. Likewise, custom PHP code within your template DOES NOT CHANGE THINGS AT ALL. Just as adding a filter like "cat filename.txt | grep Monkey" doesn't force-GPL your text, adding "print theme_ugly_child()" to your Drupal theme doesn't either.

You can, of course, license your *template design* any way you'd like, just as much as I can convert a text file to a PDF, but have no legal ownership of the *PDF document specification format".

But, even though you can license your template design to, say, LGPL, that does NOT mean that Drupal.org will play host to it. When you signed up for a CVS account, you needed to agree that you would only use our services (bug trackers, CVS repositories, hosting, forums, etc.) for GPL code. This was a conscious decision by the Drupal developers so that we wouldn't have to get into these long and boring conversations which everyone would like to turn into a jihad.

The short end of it is, regarding themes:

• yes, you can license your template design however you'd like.
• if you plan to offer your template on Drupal.org, it MUST be GPL.

As for modules, the GPL FAQ is clear in "What is the difference between mere aggregation and combining two modules into one program?": If modules are designed to run linked together in a shared address space, that almost surely means combining them into one program. Modules require Drupal to run, and most certainly reside in the same shared address space (ie., "global $user" works). This, however, does NOT mean you MUST release them ("Does the GPL require that source code of modified versions be posted to the public?"), or give them to folks that deliberately ask for them. If, however, you do make your code public, then it MUST be released under the GPL.

http://disobey.com/
http://gamegrene.com/

"These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
sections when you distribute them as separate works."

Why couldn't a theme or a module be considered a "seperate work?" I think such an interpertation is resonable if at least the follow condictions are met:

1) the theme or module is was written from scrach and didn't contain code from an existing GPLed theme or module.

2) The theme or module was not distributed as as part of a new version or fork of Drupal.

I'm not a lawyer and I'm a new guy to the Drupal community, but this seems to make sense to me. How is a module designed to work with drupal different from a program that is designed to work with an operating system. No one would consider a program designed to run on Windows a derivitive work of Windows. No one argues that the a program designed to run on Linux must be GPLed just because Linux is GPLed.

The Civicrm module is not licensed under the GPL it's licensed under the Affero General Public License, which I don't think is compatable with GPL2.