[NTLUG:Discuss] Any hope for *Office unification

[Ralph Green]

On Thu, 2011-06-30 at 00:19 -0500, Leroy Tennison wrote:
> I'm more confused than I was,  why is it (not why it came about) that 
> OpenOffice can't use LibreOffice code?  What aspect of the LibreOffice 
> license is causing problems?

Leroy,
  LibreOffice is licensed under a joint LGPLv3 and MPL license for new
code.  So, a product based off that code base that is distributed
requires the source code to be made available to those who receive
distribution.  Both licenses have that requirement, so however you
choose to license it, you have to meet that restriction.
  OpenOffice will be under an Apache license.  It does not have the
requirement that source code be made available to those who receive
distribution.
  So, code taken from OpenOffice can be used in LibreOffice.  The people
who receive that subsequent distribution will have all the rights that
the OpenOffice code contributers expected and the license enforces.
But, if OpenOffice takes code from LibreOffice and distributes it, the
code would not meet the requirements of the LibreOffice contributers and
license.  That is because OpenOffice would not enforce the requirement
that people who receive a distribution get access to the source code.
Because OpenOffice can't enforce that, they cannot use code from the
LibreOffice project.

 I am not a lawyer, and you should not depend on this explanation for
any legal decisions.  But, it does represent my understanding of the
issue.

 There are ways around these problems, of course.  If some amazing new
module was contributed to LibreOffice, the OpenOffice project could ask
that the code also be contributed to their project under a license they
could accept.  If I contributed the code, I would probably turn them
down.  The Apache license does not respect the user's rights in terms of
source code and that matters to me.  It does not matter to some people
and they would give approval.
Good day,
Ralph