Hi Raul

This issue was raised again recently, so I am doing some research. I understand what you are saying about a user. But obviously here the issue is not about the user, but rather Joomlhacks which is indeed distributing a GPL piece of code that connects to a non-GPL piece of code. Thus not being really a GPL piece of code as it does not comply with the GPL rules (as you described).

I am not familiar with the bridge code, but simply would like to know if it does make calls to SMF code, or if it only process user data from DB. In other words, is it GPL compliant or not ?

Thanks for any input

Hi Leo,

You'll have to explain to me what's out of context here :
What I am trying to do is made some people here aware of some issues they will be facing. From the answers above, it seems the people that had planned to spend some time working on, supporting users of, .. the SMF bridge were unaware of the implications of Joomla team decision and subsequent SMF decision (asking to enforce their own licence) for their work, so I don't think it was totally useless to bring this information to their attention. You may think otherwise, that's fine by me.

Regards to all, and sorry about this response to Leo, there won't be more pollution of your forum by me.

Regards

What I meant was : this is only Joomla official opinion. It does not have any legal value, it is just their interpreation (and their legal counsel interpretation) of the licence...

Certainly not so. They explain what they think and take a position. If your lawyer has a different opinion, and you trust him, then you do as you like, distribute what you like, then Joomla OSM will/may sue you and then a court will decide. That was a large part of the initial discussion actually : only acourts can decide the matter, and there has never been a court decision on this matter. Then again, if there was any, what validity will it have depending on where you live, etc
No one wants to go that far, but this issues basically jumps back into our face today with the 1.1.13 compatibilty issues...

Well, what I am really thinking is that we should get a second opinion there, cause it is always the FSF opinion, we all know they are GPL supporters, and that's fine, but maybe other lawyers may differ. I am afraid actually other lawyers will differ 

Hi Kevin,

It is even worst than you think because here we are talking only about free and open source stuff on all sides. THe point made by FSF lawyers in the SMF post I linked too was that if there is a GPL script, and you use a bridge to link it to something else, then the bridge itself becomes GPL (just like nowadays Joomla components have to be GPL), but equally the "target" script, in that case SMF, becomes GPL as well. Because SMF is not licensed under the GPL (and won't be), then there is a problem somewhere, and my (non-lawyer) conclusion was that there is a problem in releasing any bridge linking Joomla to anything else that is not GPL. So I raised the issue...

[EDIT] Superdaantje  posted while I was writing this. I guess he/she says he/she gets to the same conclusion

Hello all,

Sorry, this is my first post here, but I have a (possibly) tough question regarding your bridge. Due to recent statements from Joomla (strict GPL enforcement) and SMF (strict SMF licence enforcement:http://www.simplemachines.org/community/index.php?topic=184557), it seems to me that the detailed answer provided in this post by the FSF makes any bridge between Joomla and SMF illegal.

What's your thoughts ?

Regards