This text should be considered a draft only! Not an actual license statement.

Sendero will be licensed under the following terms:

  • The framework may be used for developing network/web applications for non-profit and/or non-commercial use under the GNU General Public License v3.
  • The framework may be used for developing network/web applications by any party, for any purpose under the GNU Affero General Public License v3. This requires that the source code for said network/web application also be open-source.
  • The framework may be used for commercial projects (without a requirement to release the source code as under the terms of the Affero GPL) under the terms of the GNU GPL v3 (for network/web applications) or LGPL v3 (for linking into software packages) if a suitable commercial license is purchased. The pricing scale will be fair. That is, a small developer working on small projects will not have to pay exorbitant fees. (I may even grant a free or nearly free license in certain cases.) I will expect large organizations with larger budgets to pay for what they are using and contribute to the development of the software in a fair (but hopefully not exorbitant manner). More details will follow. Special exceptions will also be available to businesses whose primary focus is sustainability and/or sustainable technology and to businesses who have adopted a firm commitment to working towards sustainability and being environmentally responsible. So you see, there will be many ways to pay for the software!
  • Certain portions of the library (smaller utilities in particular) may be released under a less-restrictive license (i.e. LGPL v3, Apache 2.0, or XFree86) and may thus be used for any purpose.

The author(s) of the Sendero framework reserve the right to release portions of the code under a different license in the future (for instance - under a BSD style license for inclusion in the Tango and/or DDBI libraries).

The author(s) of the Sendero framework understand that by releasing their library under a GPL/AGPL/commercial license scheme that they are going against the current licensing trend within the D/Tango community (that is BSD). This is not because of any deep philosophical disagreement with those communities. To the contrary, the Sendero project would like to make every effort possible to collaborate with the rest of the D community especially the Tango/DDBI projects which are essential to Sendero and the Sendero team greatly appreciates the contributions of those projects. Sendero is being release under this licensing scheme simply because after carefully considering the merits of both licensing philosophies and reading various articles and discussions regarding them, I have found the GPL/AGPL/commercial scheme to be most appropriate. Here are some perspectives swayed my opinion:

I recognize the value of the BSD license scheme as well for certain projects which is why I have been and continue to be willing to release portions of my code under that scheme or another less-restrictive license.