Re: Org-mode exporters licensing

[Achim Gratz <Stromeko@nexgo.de>]

Marcin Borkowski writes:
> I'm preparing a tutorial on writing Org-mode exporters.  To this end,
> I'm writing a (simplistic) Oddmuse/WikiCreole exporter.  Rather
> obviously, I'm modeling it on existing exporters (mainly ox-latex),
> which seem to share a lot of structure (function names and docstrings in
> particular).  I'd like to put my code in public domain.

I'm pretty sure that you cannot do that, for the simple reason that you
cannot unilaterally waive all creators' rights (of which copyright is
one part) in the EU to the best of my knowledge.  There is also no such
thing as "putting something into the public domain" in most
jurisdictions anyway, since PD is defined as the absence of any
applicable statutory rights.  This also makes PD a very shaky ground to
stand on, since something that is in the PD in one jurisdiction doesn't
necessarily stay that way in another.  You can license your publication
in a way that effectively makes it indistinguishable from PD, though.

> However, I reuse parts of GPL'd code (as I mentioned, quite generic
> ones, but still).  Is it fine, or should I expect a visit from EFF
> lawyers or something?

If the reuse is substantial enough (from your description I'd say yes),
then you have to license the result as GPL also.  That is just for the
code, not the tutorial, however.


Regards,
Achim.
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