Java Programmer's Toolkit/Java Programmer's Toolkit.iso/gs3.53/commprod.doc

Text File | 1996-01-10 | 11.6 KB | 235 lines

   Copyright (C) 1993, 1994, 1995 Aladdin Enterprises.  All rights reserved.

Permission to copy and distribute this document unmodified for any
purpose is hereby granted without fee, provided that the above
copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

This file, commprod.doc, sets forth the conditions under which Ghostscript
may be distributed in a commercial context: under a written license from
Artifex Software Inc., Aladdin Enterprises' exclusive commercial licensing
partner, or under certain other very limited conditions.

For an overview of Ghostscript and a list of the documentation files, see
the README file in the Ghostscript fileset.


    The Use of the Public Access "Free" Version of Ghostscript
    ----------------------------------------------------------

Ghostscript is a copyrighted work whose copyright is owned by Aladdin
Enterprises.  Some versions of Ghostscript are distributed freely under the
name Aladdin Ghostscript; these versions are always distributed with a
license, called the Aladdin Ghostscript Free Public License (also known as
the AGFPL), which permits Aladdin Ghostscript to be redistributed freely
under certain conditions.  These conditions will almost always be met easily
by individuals in their personal use of Aladdin Ghostscript.  Aladdin
Ghostscript may be *used* freely, including by commercial entities for
evaluation or unsupported internal use.  However, *distribution* for
commercial purposes of Ghostscript, or anything containing or derived from
Ghostscript in whole or in part, generally requires a written commercial
license from Artifex Software Inc., the sole entity authorized by Aladdin
Enterprises to grant such licenses.  More specifically, the AGFPL states:

    Distribution of the Program or any work based on the Program by a
    commercial organization to any third party is prohibited if any payment is
    made in connection with such distribution, whether directly (as in payment
    for a copy of the Program) or indirectly (as in payment for some service
    related to the Program, or payment for some product or service that
    includes a copy of the Program "without charge"; these are only examples,
    and not an exhaustive enumeration of prohibited activities).  However, the
    following methods of distribution involving payment shall not in and of
    themselves be a violation of this restriction:

    (i) Posting the Program on a public access information storage and
    retrieval service for which a fee is received for retrieving information
    (such as an on-line service), provided that the fee is not
    content-dependent (i.e., the fee would be the same for retrieving the same
    volume of information consisting of random data).

    (ii) Distributing the Program on a CD-ROM, provided that the files
    containing the Program are reproduced entirely and verbatim on such
    CD-ROM, and provided further that all information on such CD-ROM be
    redistributable for non-commercial purposes without charge.

The intent of the exception provided in clause (i) is to allow commercial
organizations operating an FTP server or a bulletin board to distribute
Aladdin Ghostscript freely from it, provided that:

    (1) the organization complies with the other provisions of the
AGFPL, which include among other things a requirement to distribute the
full source code of Aladdin Ghostscript and of any derived work, and to
distribute the AGFPL itself along with Aladdin Ghostscript;

    (2) the only charge for downloading Aladdin Ghostscript is a charge
based on the distribution service and not one based on the content of the
information being retrieved (i.e., the charge would be the same for
retrieving a random collection of bits of the same size);

    (3) the server or BBS is accessible to the general public, i.e.,
the phone number or IP address is not kept secret, and anyone may obtain
access to the information (possibly by paying a subscription or access fee
that is not dependent on or related to purchasing anything else).

Similarly, the exception in clause (ii) is intended to allow inclusion of
Aladdin Ghostscript on "freeware" CD-ROMs that contain only material that is
in the public domain, or is freely redistributable provided only that a
copyright notice is retained (such as the Independent JPEG Group libraries),
or is distributed under some other kind of license allowing free
redistribution such as the GNU General Public License.

If you want to distribute software in a commercial context that incorporates
Ghostscript and you do *not* want to meet these conditions, you should
contact Artifex Software to find out about commercial licensing.  Commercial
licenses involve a (negotiated) payment, and include support and other
benefits.  These are the only ways you legally can distribute Ghostscript or
anything containing Ghostscript: either by distributing Aladdin Ghostscript
under the requirements of the AGFPL, or by getting a commercial license from
Artifex Software.

For commercial licensing, please contact:

    In the U.S. and all parts of the world except Europe:

        Miles Jones
        Director of Marketing
        Artifex Software Inc.
        454 Las Gallinas Ave., suite 108
        San Rafael, CA 94903  U.S.A.
        voice [phone]
        fax [phone]
        e-mail: [e-mail]

    In Europe, as a representative of Artifex Software:

        Informationstechnick, Netzwerke und Systeme Vertriebs-GmbH
        Christoph Strozyk
        Postfach 101312
        D-44543 Castrop-Rauxel
        Germany
        Tel. [phone]
        Fax. [phone]
        e-mail: [e-mail]

If you have any questions about any of the information in this document,
please contact:

        Aladdin Enterprises
        P.O. box 60264
        Palo Alto, CA 94306
        U.S.A.
        voice phone [phone]
        fax [phone]
        [e-mail]

Appendix: The GNU General Public License
----------------------------------------

Older versions of Ghostscript (versions of 2.6.1 and previous) were
distributed with a license called the GNU General Public License (also known
as the "GNU License", the "GPL", or the "copyleft"), which allowed
distribution with commercial products under certain conditions.  Aladdin
Enterprises may choose to distribute other versions of Ghostscript with the
GPL in the future; however, these versions will be identified as "GNU
Ghostscript."  The remainder of this Appendix applies only to versions
identified explicitly as GNU Ghostscript versions; the generic name
Ghostscript, when applied to versions above 2.6.1, refers to Aladdin
Ghostscript, which is governed by the Aladdin Ghostscript Free Public
License, not the GPL.

For those unfamiliar with the GPL, we now summarize its provisions.  The
full GPL is included under the name COPYING in the fileset that comprises
GNU Ghostscript, and can also be obtained from:
    Free Software Foundation, Inc. (FSF)
    59 Temple Place - Suite 330
    Boston, MA 02111-1307
    U.S.A.
    tel. [phone]
    fax (including Japan): [phone]
    e-mail [e-mail]
    Free Dial Fax (in Japan): 0031-13-2473 (KDD)
                  0066-3382-0158 (IDC)
In case of doubt or conflict, the contents of the COPYING file or the
document obtained from the FSF, not this summary, are authoritative.

    1. Anyone may copy and distribute GNU Ghostscript (both source and
object code), but they must distribute the source code as well as the
object code (or, if they distribute only the object code, they must
include an offer in writing to provide the source code at no more than
reproduction cost), keep all copyright and other notices, and include the
GPL with the copies.  (Note that this allows anyone receiving such a copy
to distribute it freely as well.)

    2. Anyone may modify GNU Ghostscript, but the provisions of #1
apply to modified or derived works as well.

    3. GNU Ghostscript may be "aggregated" with another program; in
this case, #1 and #2 do not apply to the other program, but only to GNU
Ghostscript.

Provision #1 makes it much harder to have a commercial business based only
on selling copies of GNU Ghostscript (as distributed with the GPL) or
products that contain GNU Ghostscript, since any customer is free to make
as many copies as they want for any purpose.  Provision #2 effectively
prevents the development of proprietary commercial products that
incorporate GNU Ghostscript without a commercial license as a part, since
these are "derived works" in the legal sense.

Questions have arisen at times in particular cases regarding provision #3
as to whether GNU Ghostscript is "aggregated" with other parts of a
commercial product, or whether the product has become a "derived work."
Normally, combining GNU Ghostscript with another piece of software creates
a "derived work"; we consider GNU Ghostscript to be "aggregated" with
another piece of software, which we will refer to as "the application",
only if all of the following conditions are met:

    - The code and documentation for GNU Ghostscript are physically
    separated from the code and documentation for the application.
    For electronic form, it is both necessary and sufficient to put
    the GNU Ghostscript code and documentation in their own directory
    tree(s).

    - GNU Ghostscript, as delivered with the application, is usable
    independently of the application.  More precisely, if a user
    deletes from the computer system all files delivered with the
    application except those in the GNU Ghostscript directories, the
    user will still be able to use GNU Ghostscript as described in
    GNU Ghostscript's documentation.  Among other things, this
    requires that GNU Ghostscript not call any routines in the
    application, and not require any data or other files supplied as
    part of the application.

    - The application calls GNU Ghostscript in a way that allows an
    ordinary user to substitute another program for GNU Ghostscript.
    (Typically this requires use of a shell script or batch file, or a
    system call like `exec'.)  More precisely, if the user deletes
    from the computer system all the files in the GNU Ghostscript
    directories, and replaces the GNU Ghostscript executable with
    another program with the same name and conforming to the same
    documentation, the application will continue to work with it.  One
    implication of this is that the GNU Ghostscript documentation must
    specify all properties of GNU Ghostscript on which the application
    relies; for example, if GNU Ghostscript has been modified by the
    addition of command line switches or language elements such as new
    operators, the documentation must describe any such additions that
    the application uses.

    - The conditions of the GPL are met with respect to GNU
    Ghostscript, including the requirement for propagation of the GPL
    and the requirement for delivering (or an offer to deliver) source
    code.

Regarding this last point, the GPL clearly intends that if the distributor
only offers to provide the GNU Ghostscript source code (as opposed to
actually distributing the source code with every copy of the application),
then they must deliver the source code in a timely way to anyone
requesting it.

The GPL makes it clear that if someone receives GNU Ghostscript only in
its GPL-licensed form, they only have a right to distribute it if they
comply with the GPL.  Aladdin Enterprises, as the copyright holder, takes
this requirement very seriously, and will, if necessary, take legal action
to ensure that anyone distributing GNU Ghostscript with the GPL complies
with the conditions set forth above.