Re: How to make a non-GPL Org-mode exporter?

[Marcin Borkowski <mbork@mbork.pl>]

On 2015-07-27, at 20:02, Nick Dokos <ndokos@gmail.com> wrote:

> Marcin Borkowski <mbork@mbork.pl> writes:
>
>> On 2015-07-27, at 14:39, Daniele Nicolodi <daniele@grinta.net> wrote:
>>
>>> Hello Marcin,
>>>
>>> On 27/07/15 14:10, Marcin Borkowski wrote:
>>>> Assume that (for some reason) I want to write an Org-mode exporter which
>>>> won't be GPL'd.  (Use-case: having written a few custom exporters, I'm
>>>> writing a tutorial on them, and I consider publishing a *tutorial* with
>>>> GPL'd code a Bad Thing™.  (The idea of a programming tutorial is that
>>>> other people can or even should reuse the code in the tutorial, right?
>>>> And I see no reason to impose GPL on them.))
>>>
>>> As Oleh Krehel pointed out in a reply to another mail of yours, if your
>>> code links to org-mode code (or other GPL code) you cannot release it
>>> under a different license. I'm not sure about how linking is intended in
>>> Elisp sense of ('require)ing a library, but I believe it is analog to
>>> executable linking in machine code programs.
>>
>> I understand, and I thank you for your clarification.  (Though I still
>> consider it plain ridiculous.  And the fact that Oleh's own blog is
>> CC-BY-NC-SA licensed, and contains many fragments of Elisp code, both
>> small snippets and whole functions, thus rendering it illegal, is
>> sweet;-).)
>>
>
> Illegal? You are building strawmen.
>
>>> Therefore, the only extensions to org-mode that can exist (and be
>>> distributed, if you write code and keep it for yourself you are not
>>> affected by the licensing terms) must be GPL.
>>>
>>> Thus, it makes little sense to continue the discussion: even if you
>>> would release the code in your tutorial under a different license, it
>>> would be or no use for who will read it.
>>
>> I see.  Funnily, I found a few Emacs blogs (also by renowned Emacs
>> hackers, like Oleh mentioned above) which clearly violate the rule that
>> any Elisp code should be GPL'd.  So my intuition that nobody cares (at
>> least until explicitly asked) seems to be confirmed;-).
>>
>
> There is no such rule anywhere so this is another strawman. You can
> write an emacs module and use whatever license you want, put it up on
> the web (or not) and do anything you want with it. Just don't expect

Really?  As Oleh wrote:

,----
| Like I said in an earlier message just a few minutes ago, you can do it,
| but you can't use org.el or Elisp at all, unless you implement your own
| Elisp engine that you call.
`----

AFAIU, he wrote about writing *any* Elisp.

> it to become part of emacs: it will have a separate life (and most
> probably a short one when you get bored with it). Ditto for your
> tutorial.

And thank you so much for your encouragement.

> Nick

Best,

-- 
Marcin Borkowski
http://octd.wmi.amu.edu.pl/en/Marcin_Borkowski
Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Science
Adam Mickiewicz University