[erlang-questions] A PropEr announcement

[Kostis Sagonas]

Torben Hoffmann wrote:
> I am afraid that the GPLv3 is contaminating in this case ...
> 
> However, as Eric mentioned earlier, the PropEr team is looking into 
> adding a FOSS License Exception and now that the big v1.0 is behind them 
> they hopefully get the time need to investigate this and see if it is 
> possible to do.
> 
> The PropEr team has been very approachable about this issue so I think 
> we should just wait for them to find the time it takes to get this done 
> right.

Thanks for this comment!

We have discussed the issue extensively yesterday and today we wrote a 
mail to the Free Software Foundation to also ask their opinion and their 
suggestion on how to properly deal with the issues involved.

Quoting from the mail we sent to FSF:

   Our primary concern is that PropEr be as useful as possible to FOSS
   programmers. Therefore, the most important requirement from PropEr's
   license is that it allows FOSS projects (regardless of license) to:

     * use PropEr without restrictions, and especially without needing to
       switch to another license
     * release their testing code under whatever license they choose
     * distribute PropEr freely, to be used as part of the build cycle of
       the project, or for other uses (e.g. if the project in question is
       an Erlang IDE, it could distribute PropEr as a plugin), again
       without needing to switch licenses

   The above benefits need *not* extend to developers of proprietary
   software. If PropEr's license could restrict them in some way, that
   would be an added bonus, but this is not a strict requirement.

   Another requirement is that PropEr's license is a (preferably strong)
   copyleft: we would like to guarantee that any extensions to PropEr are
   also free software.

   // ... We also told them about the issue that the GPL is supposedly
   //     unusable for Erlang programs due to the nature of Erlang.

In short, we are looking for a solution/license that will allow at least 
all open-source projects to use PropEr without any restrictions or by 
being contaminated by GPL.

I'll be surprised if we do not find a solution, but please bear with us 
until we resolve this the proper way.

In the meantime, you can use the software and the proper e-mail address 
for questions and comments.

Kostis