Commercial vs Open Source
May 19, 2009 - 12:14pm
No purchase necessary...
...ever.
Joomla is FOSS (Free Open Source Software) and you can simply download the code, install it, and start whacking away. There are some add-ons (modules, components, and templates) that are commercial, but there are also a lot of free ones. You can start with those and see if you even find a need for the commercial ones (I haven't, as yet).
The Joomla dev team is committed to the GPL, to the point they are going to start de-listing from the JED (Joomla Extensions Directory) all the extensions who don't license with an OS license. Basically, they're telling the commercial add-ons no more free advertising.
As for "try before you buy": That's up to each commercial vendor, there's no set policy for all to follow.
June 15, 2009 - 9:58am
Commercial v. GPL v. Commercial GPL
I'm not an attorney (so take it with a grain of salt), but my understanding of the GPL license is that it is focused on access to the underlying code and rights to modify and/or redistribute it. Being GPL doesn't mean that it will be free of cost but that it will be free as in "free speech". So, you will still have commercial software that is licensed under GPL and there will still be "commercial" software in the JED as long as it is licensed under the GPL.
http://community.joomla.org/bl...
If you are interested, there is a really good book by Martin Fink call "The Business and Economics of Linux and Open Source."
You can also look at a pretty famous paper from Eric Raymond called "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" at http://catb.org/esr/writings/c....
June 15, 2009 - 12:57pm
Yes, but...
The GPL doesn't prevent me from from charging you for my software. It *does* however, prevent me from stopping you from making copies after you purchase it and distributing them for free. From the GPL FAQ page:
"Does the GPL allow me to require that anyone who receives the software must pay me a fee and/or notify me?
"No. In fact, a requirement like that would make the program non-free. If people have to pay when they get a copy of a program, or if they have to notify anyone in particular, then the program is not free. See the definition of free software.
"The GPL is a free software license, and therefore it permits people to use and even redistribute the software without being required to pay anyone a fee for doing so.
"If I distribute GPL'd software for a fee, am I required to also make it available to the public without a charge?
"No. However, if someone pays your fee and gets a copy, the GPL gives them the freedom to release it to the public, with or without a fee. For example, someone could pay your fee, and then put her copy on a web site for the general public."
The net effect of those provisions is that GPL'ed software is usually free, as in beer, as well as free, as in speech. GPL effectively enforces a "first-sale" doctrine on software.
June 15, 2009 - 1:36pm
June 15, 2009 - 2:00pm
The point was/is that there will still be commercial extensions
Yes. That page is a great resource for the subject (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gp...).
The point that I was making is that there will still be commercial extensions available in the JED, which you do pay for. A lot of people assume that open source equals free (as in no cost) even though it really just refers to freedom of access to the code.
It is a whole separate discussion about whether it would be right about taking someone's commercial GPL software that they are using to try to make a living and feed their family, etc. and giving it away for free to others. There is legal and there is ethical and the two are not always the same.
June 15, 2009 - 5:05pm
June 16, 2009 - 11:30am
Depends...
If your product qualifies as a derived work from a GPL'ed product, then you have to.
It's one reason I dislike GPL. The license fee it charges (you no longer have a choice about how you license your own work) is too steep. I prefer OS licenses like BSD, that give you the choice of how you want to proceed.
I was going to start looking into Joomla and playing around with it.
Can someone school me on the commercial aspect of it? I mean, do you have to purchase something to try it out to see if it does what you want it to do? Or is it more like try it, like it, and buy it?
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