"Diane Cabell" <dcabell@law.harvard.edu> writes:

"David Abrahams" <dave@boost-consulting.com> wrote:

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Diane, I want to clarify something you may have missed: the point in question does not concern the Boost license itself, but the way in which our source files declare the license to be applicable to them. They do not contain a copy of the license, but instead make reference to it in a comment, typically:

// Copyright David Abrahams 2004. Use, modification and distribution is // subject to the Boost Software License, Version 1.0. (See accompanying // file LICENSE_1_0.txt or copy at http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt)

No, I didn't understand that.

You could just say // Copyright David Abrahams 2004 and made available subject to the terms of Boost Software License, // Version 1.0. (See accompanying // file LICENSE_1_0.txt or copy at http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt)

Thanks, that seems less prone to misinterpretation to me also. Would // Copyright David Abrahams 2004. Distributed under the Boost // Software License, Version 1.0. (See accompanying file // LICENSE_1_0.txt or copy at http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt) do just as well? It's just just a little less wordy -- "made available subject ot the terms of" sticks in my craw a bit.

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David Abrahams wrote:

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Ugh I don't think we ever considered that "display" would be interpreted other than to mean "display publicly". Does that mean that in the license:

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person or organization obtaining a copy of the software and accompanying documentation covered by this license (the "Software") to use, reproduce, display, distribute, execute, and transmit the Software, and to prepare derivative works of the Software, and to permit third-parties to whom the Software is furnished to do so, all subject to the following:

"display" ought to be "display publicly"?

Yes. But again, private display doesn't require permission, so a court would likely interpret this to language to mean "public display." If it went to court, you'd get to testify as to that intention.

So IIUC, changing the license wording isn't critical. We should probably wait 'till a critical issue comes up before making any non-critical changes.

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This is what makes me think you might have missed the fact that "use, modification and distribution" isn't in the license itself. The suggestion is that "use, modification and distribution" be removed from source files to avoid having to repeat all the rights named in the license.

Yes, I did miss that. I think it will be solved by deleting reference to any specific rights in the comment.

Great.

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(....) Sorry, I think I was just bringing up a linguistic technicality. These are all copyrightable files. The question is whether a *thing* can be subject to a license, or only actions that might be performed on that thing. That's why I suggested "licensed under ... " instead of "subject to ... ".

Copyright licenses copying; patents protect operations. Since patent rights were only recently recognized for pure software, the line is not really clear in a lot of cases. Interpretation of the licenses isn't just limited to the linuisitics, however, but looks at the purpose the agreement is trying to accomplish, what people in the trade normally intend to happen in such situations, etc.

I'm not sure how to apply that information to our situation. My remark about "subject to" was akin to saying "I think you're using a noun as a verb; here's a way to phrase it that avoids grammatical problems."

Then I still don't understand your query. The file is a thing and you are licensing rights to use the thing. The rights are verbs, permitting people (or machines) to perform certain activities using the thing. Both of them are subject to the license. I think we're OK. Maybe Devin has another perspective. dc

Great, thanks for all your help. -- Dave Abrahams Boost Consulting www.boost-consulting.com