On Thu, Feb 15, 2007 at 09:07:25PM -0500, Philippe Cloutier wrote: > >>GOVERNMENT USE: If you are acquiring this software on behalf of the U.S. > >>government, the Government shall have only "Restricted Rights" in the > >>software and related documentation as defined in the Federal Acquisition > >>Regulations (FARs) in Clause 52.227.19 (c) (2). If you are acquiring the > >>software on behalf of the Department of Defense, the software shall be > >>classified as "Commercial Computer Software" and the Government shall have > >>only "Restricted Rights" as defined in Clause 252.227-7013 (c) (1) of > >>DFARs. Notwithstanding the foregoing, the authors grant the U.S. > >>Government and others acting in its behalf permission to use and > >>distribute the software in accordance with the terms specified in this > >>license.
> >>IANAL, but this seems to prohibit some things allowed by the GPL to the > >>U.S. government. If I understand right, the U.S. Department of Defense is > >>not allowed to redistribute or copy freely des.tcl, which would violate > >>the DFSG. > >No, this is a statement that the copyright on the work is not *waived* > >where > >the federal government is concerned. It doesn't contradict the GPL, it > >merely clarifies that the government has no implicit, special rights over > >the software beyond those specified in the GPL. > Hum, this is not what I read. Do you agree that the license basically > states that the Department of Defense has only "Restricted Rights" as > defined in Clause 252.227-7013 (c) (1) of DFARs on the software? Have you read the cited clause of DFARs? The numbering listed in this clause appears to be obsolete, but "Restricted Rights" as specified in the current version enumerates an extensive list of things the government is allowed to do. But in any case, the following sentence is what matters: Notwithstanding the foregoing, the authors grant the U.S. Government and others acting in its behalf permission to use and distribute the software in accordance with the terms specified in this license. IOW, in *spite* of citing this government regulation, permission is granted to use and distribute the software *under the normal license*. Again, this is an effort to keep the government from claiming *more* rights over the software than what's permitted by the usual license, not to prevent the government from exercising rights that are granted to everyone else. -- Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.debian.org/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
