[Savannah-cvs] [PhpIssues] sum up PHPL<->GPL compatibility issue

[Beuc]

The PHP License has a couple clauses that are incompatible with the GNU GPL 
(versions 2 and 3) because they restrict usage of the name "PHP". Usually a 
name is protected using a trademark. When it is done in the license however, 
this introduces new requirements, and those requirements are not in the GNU 
GPL. So, despite the fact the PHP _License_ is a free software license, and a 
permissive one, it is not compatible with the GNU GPL.

This is not a problem for the PHP language itself, because the GNU GPL makes an 
exception for a project's underlying programming language (this exception 
allows you to distribute GPL'd applications that works for MS Windows, for 
example).

The real issue is when the PHP License, which is meant for the PHP programming 
language only, is used for other works. A notable amont of such works come from 
the PEAR libraries (http://pear.php.net/).

In short: don't use PEAR packages under the PHP License with your GPL'd 
applications, or urge their maintainer to switch the modified BSD license, 
which is very similar except for the "trademark" clauses. mBSD is also 
compatible with the PHP License, so such code may be included in the PHP 
distribution if need be. It is worth noting that trying to preserve the PHP 
name in a separate software package has no effect, so those clauses are pretty 
useless in the context of PEAR.

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More details:

Here are the relevant clauses
(http://www.php.net/license/3_01.txt)::

 3. The name "PHP" must not be used to endorse or promote products
 derived from this software without prior written permission. For
 written permission, please contact address@hidden
 
 4. Products derived from this software may not be called "PHP", nor
 may "PHP" appear in their name, without prior written permission
 from address@hidden You may indicate that your software works in
 conjunction with PHP by saying "Foo for PHP" instead of calling
 it "PHP Foo" or "phpfoo"


I approached the PEAR developers to raise awareness of this issue 
(independently of Savannah):
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.php.pear.devel/40682/focus=40682

This had some good results, with some packages relicensing:
http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.php.pear.devel/40682/focus=40682

However not everybody understood the point. Among them one of the PHP 
maintainers, who confused "derived work" and "aggregation". His answer was also 
quoted in the FAQ (without a link to the rest of the discussion). This is 
unfortunate for the PHP maintainer, because it was a pretty inaccurate 
statement:
http://pear.php.net/manual/en/faq.devs.php

Attemping to reason the FAQ maintainer failed:
http://pear.php.net/bugs/bug.php?id=9630

Not all packages can be relicensed anyway, because there is no formal copyright 
assignment, so each and every author would have to be contacted - which is the 
main difficulty of the process.


An interesting question at the time was to know whether the GNU GPL v3 would be 
compatible, or not. After some talk with address@hidden, it appears that the 
latest draft isn't compatible with the PHP License, and is not moving in that 
direction. (<<not that Section 7(e) is meant to be read *very* literally -- 
i.e., compatible clauses should say something like "This license does not grant 
you permission to use our trademarks." Anything that goes beyond that is almost 
certainly not acceptable because it won't account for things like fair use of 
the trademark, etc.>> --brett).


There was another confusion because the FSF pages mentioned version 3.00 of the 
PHPL, but there was a new 3.01 which fixed other distribution issues pointed 
out by Debian. The FSF pages are now updated to mention 3.01 - and the changes 
have no effect on the compatibility issue 
(http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/savannah-hackers-public/2006-12/msg00023.html).


So, the PHPL and the GNU GPL are not compatible and aren't going to be.
We encourage PEAR developers to switch to the modified BSD and fix the PEAR FAQ.

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