[ptx] hugin dependancies & sources for panorama-tools-nonfree

[JD Smith]

On Wed, 2005-01-05 at 11:40 -0800, David Grant wrote:
> Carsten Schurig wrote:
> 
> >On Tue, 04 Jan 2005 12:25:10 -0800 David Grant wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>Curious, can someone remove the GPL license from their software,
> >>if they decide to do so?
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >Well, at least for future releases: yes. But for already released
> >versions? I don't know...
> >
> >  
> >
> Well, I looked at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-violation.html and one 
> thing listed which is questionable for Helmut's panotools is that he 
> doesn't clearly say which software is convered by the LIcense. He may be 
> saved by his ambiguity.
> 
> At his old site, http://www.path.unimelb.edu.au/~dersch/ (mirror), he 
> says that "Panorama Tools" and "PTStitcher" are free and open source 
> software, but there is no mention of GPL there. And he says PTStitcher 
> but not anything else called PT*.

I think, since he is the original copyright holder, it is his
prerogative to change the license at will, even if he had stated they
were GPL'd.  Since he never distributed the source, he could easily just
say: "I changed my mind, this is now licensed with a freeware-like
license".  

Had he distributed it under the GPL, he could not stop others from
improving and distributing the source, but since he didn't, I think he's
pretty much free to do what he pleases.  Another way of saying this is
you can't be in violation of your own license, if you are the copyright
holder on the complete work.  You could even make some improvements and
take it closed source, or offer dual licensing (but of course the
previous GPL'd version could not be retracted, had it been released).

JD