Number of GPL v3 projects tops 2,000 116
Da Massive writes "The number of open-source projects that use the GNU General Public License Version 3 has grown to more than 2,000, according to Palamida, which sells software and services for tracking open-source code within a customer's code base. 'Our database now contains over 2,000 projects that are using the GPL v3. "At this rate the GPL v3 is being adopted by 1,000 projects every 4-5 months, and if the trend continues, the license will be used by 5,000 projects by the end of the year," states a recent posting on Palamida's blog.'"
GPLv2 compliance-? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Linear interpolation... (Score:5, Informative)
The article itself does not have a distribution, but the blog linked to by the article does: Palamida blog complete with chart [blogspot.com]. There was a definite surge last year of GPL3 projects, followed a sharp decline in December. The number of add projects, however, has been slowly climbing for the first few months of 2008.
Re:Twice nothing is still nothing ... (Score:1, Informative)
Graph (Score:2, Informative)
A simple linear interpretation of the data isn't that useful - maybe I should RTFA to see if there's a graph or something?
Re:GPL (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Linear interpolation... (Score:4, Informative)
This makes it sound like there was a decline in GPL3 projects, which isn't the case. There was a decline in the growth rate of GPL3 projects, meaning that the number of GPL3 projects grew, only not as fast as in previous months.
Re:And this matters, why? (Score:5, Informative)
1) If you receive software and hardware together from a vendor, and the software is released under the GPLv3 license, you have legal assurance that they will not attempt through hardware to prevent you exercising your right to change the code and deploy your changes. If you receive software released under the GPLv2 license, you do not have these assurances. You can reasonably expect that the pressure on the vendor to increase revenue will lead to them attempting to rent out the control they have over you to third parties.
2) If you use or redistribute software, and the software is released under the GPLv3 license, you have legal assurances that you will not wake up one morning and find that the software you have come to rely on is now subject to patents that the vendor received. If you receive software released under the GPLv2 license, you could suddenly be forced to pay large sums of money or stop using the technology. This is a large risk that can tank a business model that relied on having liberty to grow without increased intellectual property costs and suddenly does not have that liberty.
Re:Linear interpolation... (Score:4, Informative)
Just as an aside, I am in no way trying to detract from the accomplishments here; this is a very nice v3 adoption rate. I was just agreeing with the original poster that the statistics deserve better interpretation than a 'grade school average over time'.
Re:GPLv2 compliance-? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Twice nothing is still nothing ... (Score:5, Informative)
As for FISH (another protocol using the SSH delivery mechanism), you still have the obscurity problem (worse than ever).
Re:And this matters, why? (Score:3, Informative)
Now, if you release something under the BSD, and you have a patent pending, and I use it to run my nuts and bolts factory, I could wake up one day and find out that you own all the profits my business generates.
If you released it under the GPLv3, I would already have a legally binding assurance that you won't do that to me.
Now, if there is a third party with patents involved, I don't have a legal release from their patents if they are not involved in our interaction.
However, one would presume that your GPLv3 code would constitute prior art in the majority of such cases, giving me a degree of relief from this risk.
If you, knowing that a third party had a previously issued patent, decided to write an implementation of that patent and release it GPLv3, then that would leave me and my nuts and bolts factory at risk.
All in all, GPLv3 is a big, big benefit for people who aren't in the software business. And, in my opinion, also a big benefit for people who want to be coders for a living. The more fat for custom work in your clients IT budget, the better. It's only those who want to be professional code owners that aren't going to benefit, overall. Personally, I'd just as soon shoot those people in the head as look at em, but that's just me.
Re:GPLv2 compliance-? (Score:2, Informative)
GladeGen also uses PyXML, which in turn uses libxml, which is MIT licensed. No problem there.
Most of the rest of the code Stylus Toolbox uses is offered under the PSF license, which is GPL3-compatible according to RMS.
PyGTK itself is LGPL and pexpect is PSF licensed.