BlazeDS LGPL V3 clearing up the confusion
I have had several questions on using BlazeDS in applications, and hence decided to create a post that addresses some of the confusion.
The Free Software Foundations GPLv3 and LGPLv3 are popular licenses, but each comes with associated risks. Since it is possible for source code under either of these to cross the boundary into your own code, every company must have their own policies when it comes to using or including GPL and LGPL software into their own offerings.
BlazeDS is distributed under a LGPL V3 license. You should check your company policy of using a GPL or LGPL software license in your product. For some companies a closed souce license may work better. Adobe offers a closed source license, which includes support and platform certification, for BlazeDS. Please contact Garen Ingleby if this is of interest to you.
BlazeDS is only supported by the community through the discussion forums. This may not be a problem for many of you, but in several cases it would be worthwhile to use open source code that is backed by Enterprise support and Platform Certification. Adobe goes through a rigorous testing and platform certification process that enables us to offer enterprise support and platform certification. Sorry for the confusion, but the support and platform certification is called “LiveCycle Data Service Community Edition” You can purchase this directly from Adobe.com for roughly $4K. Follow this link for more details.
Upcoming Changes
We understand that many of you are looking for exceptional value when it comes to BlazeDS and LC DS. We are working on a proposal internally to address just that. Watch out, I will post more details as we finalize this proposal.
Anil, I’ve never met you but I know a number of folks within Adobe on the CF & AIR side. I’m going to give you my direct opinion on this & hopefully you’ll take it for what it is; constructive criticism.
Seriously, you could’ve done a much better job of directing users on this topic. Here’s basically what you said:
“If you don’t want to worry about the risks, pay us. Otherwise, contact your legal team for advice on the LGPL”
I really think you should go back and make an attempt to properly explain what the supposed “risks” are of the LGPL v3 license before immediately trying to sell them on a closed source license or a $4k support policy. Your post comes off very much like an upsell and while I know Adobe is a for-profit, I think it’s important that you guys at least try to be more forthcoming with information without it always being coupled with a sales pitch.
Rey Bango
April 23, 2009 at 7:38 pm
It does come across a bit like a Microsoft scare tatic to extract money, doesn’t it ?
Tom Chiverton
April 24, 2009 at 8:57 am
@Tom: Yep it does which is why I’m hoping that Anil will take the time to give a thoughtful explanation of this.
Rey Bango
April 24, 2009 at 9:07 am
I hear you. The intention of this post is not to force a sale or to use scare tactics, but to clarify the available choices/options.
I know of organization that will not use an LGPL licensed product in a product. Some customers, primarily product vendors, like to use a closed source license as it also comes with support and subscription. So I know the need exists.
I did consult with our legal team to get their opinion on the risks. The answers were mostly “It depends on the context”. I wish there was just one unambiguous answer, but there isn’t. Hence, the recommendation to consult with your companies legal dept.
FYI: Right now the LCDS team is adding some new 3rd party libraries in our next release of the product, and I am going through the legal clearance process.
Anil
April 24, 2009 at 9:53 am
Having seen several companies go through this, I do know that your legal team could’ve at least given you some examples that could help users better understand the reasons why an LGPL license may not be the best. It just seems that you could’ve fleshed this out better.
Rey Bango
April 24, 2009 at 10:04 am
Oh and to clarify, I’m in no way against offering cost-based solutions. I know there are a lot of “free software” supporters out there and while I do like free software, I’m also supportive of those that are investing heavily in producing great products.
It’s one of the reasons that I still promote ColdFusion.
Rey Bango
April 24, 2009 at 10:06 am
I think one area of risk is in bundling LGPL code with commercial code for distribution: you need to be careful that the LGPL code is packaged “separately” within your overall distribution, i.e., that files from an LGPL package are not mixed in with your own IP-covered files – so don’t modify anything in the LGPL folders (unless you release it back as LGPL code!) and don’t put LGPL files in your own folders.
As Anil indicates, it isn’t particularly clear cut and it really does depend on how your own legal team views the (legal) risks of packaging and redistribution. It’s also why various companies will adopt policies that accept, say, Apache Source License 2.0 but will not accept GPL or LGPL code.
Sean Corfield
April 26, 2009 at 6:26 pm
(I’d like to thank Alex Glosband for pointing me to this page.)
The part of the BlazeDS source that I can’t make heads or tails of, from a LGPLv3 point of view, is that to build an unaltered version of the fle-messaging-opt.jar (from modules/opt), a number of commercial jars are required – jrun.jar, weblogic.jar, etc.
Since no license information is in the BlazeDS source for these commercial jars, its not clear if its possible for anyone besides Adobe to convey an unmodified version of the source and accompanying build scripts and files such that an end customer could build BlazeDS themselves.
This is a different situation than most other LGPLv3 jars and their source code. They typically only depend on other Open Source jars at build time.
One way out would be to modify the opt\build.xml file, to only reference the Tomcat related login classes, and then to ship a modified version of the source and build files without the commercial jars.
Another way out would be for Adobe/BlazeDS to change the build structure and the contents of the flex-messaging-opt.jar to only include the parts that can be built with open source software.
I’m not sure how the Commercial license link mentioned above applies to someone building a product for wider distribution that is using BlazeDS. The Commercial BlazeDS license seems to be more applicable to an internal enterprise application where BlazeDS is being used on a few servers.
I can see how the LCDS usage fit this model. But it seems to me that most Java/Flex developers who take an interest in BlazeDS will be approaching it from the standpoint of shipping it as part of their Java/Flex product, with no idea how many servers it will be installed on.
Carlos Bonilla
April 29, 2009 at 10:37 pm
It does come across a bit like a Microsoft scare tatic to extract money, doesn’t it ?
PB
May 26, 2009 at 11:59 pm
Hi Anil,
I am getting a little confused with this blog. LGPLV3 does allow for redistribution of LGPLV3 code in commercial products. However, the other post on Adobe (http://forums.adobe.com/message/1140697#1140697) by you mentions we need to contact Adobe for a commercial license of BlazeDS if we use BlazeDS in a commercial product. If we don’t modify the BlazeDS source code in our commercial product, do we still need to get a commercial license from Adobe ?
Jagan
Jagan
August 4, 2009 at 8:49 am
You are right that you don’t need to buy a commercial license from Adobe to use BlazeDS in your product. Please make sure you check with your legal team for LGPL compliance.
Anil
August 4, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Great post full of useful tips! My site is fairly new and I am having a difficult time getting my subscribers to leave comments. They are coming to the website but I have the feeling that “nobody wants to be first”.
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Micah Danna
August 8, 2011 at 12:17 am
BlazeDS looks great. See this quick introduction to BlazeDS and comparison to LiveCycleDS.
http://www.rivellomultimediaconsulting.com/blazeds-installation-and-sample-apps/
-Sam
Samuel Asher Rivello
February 3, 2012 at 6:06 am