[Kdeev-books] First cut - scripting chapter, dcop chapterand structure

[Jan Schumacher]

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On Sunday 31 August 2003 17:14, Ralf Nolden wrote:
> On Sonntag, 31. August 2003 16:48, Jan Schumacher wrote:
> > It is not necessary at all to give KDE e.V. any special rights at all, if
> > the license of the book is reasonably free. In my earlier mail I already
> > mentioned that I'd prefer the GPL of the GFDL, but both will assure that
> > anyone is allowed to publish the book.
>
> You may be right with that, and I prefer a fully open license over the open
> publication license as well. The issue I have with using the GPL is that
> when I wrote the KDevelop docs (~500 pages) the book got printed and I had
> to buy a version for my own records. The FDL at least makes sure that you
> get a copy for yourself plus that the covers have to mention the author.

Does the GFDL do that? I can't find any provision in the GFDL that demands 
copies for the original authors. My earlier offer to pay into a pool for free 
hardcopies for authors still stands. I can't afford to buy several books, but 
maybe one or two.

> For publishing companies it also matters which license the book(s) have.
> Although they prefer non-free licenses, O'Reilly for instance publishes FDL
> books as well. In most cases they want to have the single publishing rights
> granted, which is something that they will pay for, which in turn means
> that when you deal with publishers you can trade to get something in
> return, even if it's low priced or that your requirement is that the books
> itself should be fairly cheap to buy for anyone (which is a desireable goal
> for us, too).

As far as I can tell from the text, and that is also what I gathered from 
discussion elsewhere, the GFDL is a copyleft license, that applies to all of 
the public. If that is true than it wouldn't allow for single publishing 
rights. You really do need a non-free license for that.

> Thus I would prefer the FDL over the GPL, if you're ok with that.

I don't really have a right to be ok with that or not. At the present I can't 
contribute much except maybe translation. That is why I offered to put forth 
a monetary contribution for the time being. But it would be a shame to have 
the definitive KDE development book under a license with such strong 
restrictions as the GFDL particularly if it does not accomplish what you 
expect of it.

Regards
Jan
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