[Owncloud] Distro packages and AGPL3 compliance

[Erwin Rennert]

You should be aware that Debain - as do Fedora and Suse - provide source 
packages for the binary packages they offer. So, the distributions 
already fulfill the requrements of the AGPL.

You should also be aware that you would need to provide the sources only 
if you were to *distribute binary packages* of owncloud. This, however, 
I believe is not your intention. You merely want to offer the use of the 
software; not the software itself.

BTW, you can legally send e-mails without having to provide the source 
code of GPLed software such as Postfix, Exim or G-d forbid, sendmail. :-)

I hope, this clarification helps.
It is always a good idea to take a step back and to re-evaluate 
suppositions we have gotten used to.

Yours,
Erwin (who is not a lawyer)

On 07/05/2013 12:02 PM, Lars Meyser wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I'm considering to install owncloud on my Debian server and I would
> prefer to use the owncloud package because it eases the maintenance
> burden for me, but I am wondering how I can comply with the AGPLv3 in
> that case. Debian (as other distros) modifies the source with several
> patches and from my reading of the AGPL that requires me to
> "prominently" offer my users a way to retrieve exactly this modified
> source code. The Debian package does nothing like that, so I suppose
> I would have to create my own app or theme in order to include links
> to the sources listed on
> http://packages.debian.org/source/experimental/owncloud? This seems
> very tedious and probably neutralizes any benefit of using distro
> packages instead of the unmodified upstream version of owncloud. This
> does not only concern Debian, I found that the Fedora and SUSE
> packages contain modifications as well. Is it actually possible to
> use distro packages of owncloud on a publically accessible server
> without violating the AGPL?
>
> Lars
>
> _______________________________________________ Owncloud mailing
> list Owncloud at kde.org https://mail.kde.org/mailman/listinfo/owncloud


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Erwin Rennert, IT Services
Center for Social Innovation

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