Hacker Timesnew | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submitlogin

BTW, you should probably change https://redislabs.com/community/oss-projects/ to match the the non-Open-Source-licenses most things have there. (yes, they are listed, but the page pretends everything on it is Open Source)


You're mixing up Open Source and Free Software, those two are not the same.


There is a difference between Open Source and merely making the source code available. See the definition here: https://opensource.org/osd

In particular, this comes into conflict with 1, Free Redistribution.


It doesn't. Anyone is able to redistribute these Redis Modules under the same license.


Here is the Free Redistribution section: "The license shall not restrict any party from selling or giving away the software as a component of an aggregate software distribution containing programs from several different sources."

Yiftech commented that the reason for making the switch was that "AGPL does not prevent cloud providers (such as AWS) from building managed services from these modules". The entire reason for making the switch to licensing the modules under the new license is that the Free Redistribution aspect of AGPL and other open source licenses allows cloud providers to use the software in a way that Redis labs doesn't like.


Cloud providers are not "giving away or selling" the software, they are running it, which isn't covered under that section.

You're probably looking for #6:

> 6. No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor

The license must not restrict anyone from making use of the program in a specific field of endeavor. For example, it may not restrict the program from being used in a business, or from being used for genetic research. ... or in this case, "offering Redis with extension X as a Service"


> You're mixing up Open Source and Free Software, those two are not the same.

There is an ideological difference between the movements, but very little practical definitions between the OSI Open Source definition and the FSF Free Software definition. Yes, they are worded differently, but in practice they are virtually identical (I don't think a single license has been reviewed by both entities with a different conclusion.)


They have different ideologies behind them, but they refer to almost exactly the same class of software. A license that doesn't allow commercial use is proprietary and closed source.


Forbidding commercial use doesn't make something closed source but it does make it proprietary. The compliment of Open Source isn't closed source.


Can you give an example of something that's neither open source nor closed source, or of something that's both open source and closed source?


Gitlab EE is one.

Not closed source since the source is public and freely given [1]. Not open source because the license [2] forbids use based on field of endeavor which is required in the OSD [3].

[1] https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee [2] https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/gitlab-ee/blob/master/LICENSE [3] https://opensource.org/osd-annotated

Not that Wikipedia is a source of truth but it does corroborate that at least some other people agree with this analysis [4].

[4] https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_source

Edit:

As for the other direction, you can't have software be Open Source and closed source simultaneously since being Open Source requires the source to be available. Or in symbols.

Free Software ⊆ Open Source ⊆ source-available

closed source ∪ source-available = 𝕌

closed source ∩ source-available = ∅


Commons Clause is neither open source nor closed source; it is proprietary. Something cannot be both open source and closed source.


Open Source software can be proprietary, see all the github repos without license information.

What you are referring to is "Free Software", as defined by Stallman.


According to most of people who invented the term "open source", the OSI and their open source definition, propritary software, even if you can see the source, is not "open source".

Nearly everyone uses the term "open source" this way, and to use it otherwise is grossly misleading.


Of course, if you follow the osi definition you are absolutely correct. [1]

"the obvious meaning for the expression “open source software”—and the one most people seem to think it means—is “You can look at the source code.”" [2]

The main problem imho lies in the fact that afaik we still don't know how to call proprietary software with released source code, although this is mighty common (again, see github). If that problem is solved, the osi definition is much better applicable.

(On a side note: A word that might describe such software is public. Public Software vs. Open Software Software. This however is again problematic because of "public-domain" software.)

[1] https://opensource.org/osd

[2] https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/open-source-misses-the-point....


> the obvious meaning for the expression “open source software”—and the one most people seem to think it means

I disagree. I think if you ask nearly people who know what the term "source code" means, if you ask them what "open source" means, they'll give the OSI definition (which is in practice the same as the FSF's 'free software' definition). They'll say it's more than "I can look at the source", but includes the rights to share and build on it.

Microsoft tried the term "Shared Source", which might be what you mean.




Guidelines | FAQ | Lists | API | Security | Legal | Apply to YC | Contact

Search: