Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Markus Bopp -
Number of replies: 10

Hi,

I am planning to publish a few Moodle Themes soon. In general, I want to license them GPL3 and add them here.

However, I am also planning to add a few bonus features to the themes that will require a paid download.

I am not going to limit functionality of the themes in the plugin directory in any way and also stick with GPL3 for the commercial bonus features.

Question: 

Is this allowed in the Plugins directory or will listings with a commercial background rejected in general?

Any kind of info would be really great!


Thanks & Regards,

Markus

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In reply to Markus Bopp

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Richard Oelmann -
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There are already a number of themes in the plugins directory that have a paid for premium version, but this is not (I believe) advertised in the plugins directory in any way.

Wont get into the whole 'paid for/purchasers can release' discussion - I presume you have already considered that smile

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In reply to Markus Bopp

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Mary Evans -
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Hi,

If you are that unsure I would advise you to first write to Moodle HQ directly and ask them for guidance/permission to do this. There is no benefit from getting mixed comments from all and sundry as many have different views, and in general are not qualified to comment on such a topic.

Personally, I do not see any a problem with what you are wanting to do, as the Essential theme does this in a similar way and no one has said anything about how Gareth manages the Essential theme, or links to his "About me" site. Just as long as you do not add advertising material in the Plugins database I don't see a problem.

Hope this helps?

Mary

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In reply to Markus Bopp

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by David Mudrák -
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As long as the theme and all the contents (fonts, graphics, photos) is legally distributed via the plugins directory under the GPLv3, and the theme description does not violate the moodle.org site policy, themes with commercial/paid features are not prohibited.

It is fair to mention in the plugin description (and the README file and eventually the administration interface of the theme) that there are additional services / features available as a paid service. Given that such a description is objective, informative, decent and fits naturally into the context, it is not seen as advertising.

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In reply to David Mudrák

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Gareth J Barnard -
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Can I add / slightly disagree (for discussion sake) with David that.... I've spent ages looking at this (and many others have too - search for the discussions on the forums) and whilst GPLv3 must apply to the PHP code, the JS, CSS, images and fonts are a different issue and due to their nature cannot be covered by GPLv3 (JS is debateable).  With images you could use Creative Commons, Fonts you can use OFL SIL.  CSS I still think needs looking at to be certain - bit of a grey area.

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In reply to Gareth J Barnard

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by David Mudrák -
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Sorry I was not precise. It is better worded at https://docs.moodle.org/dev/Plugin_contribution_checklist#Licensing

Yes, I am aware of many discussions on this topic both here as well in other open source PHP projects (like Wordpress or Drupal).

We follow the interpretation that as long as your PHP code share the server memory with the Moodle PHP, i.e. includes the library code, directly accesses the data structures etc, the viral nature of GPL applies. Other contents like JS or media files do not directly link with GPL'ed code. But as long as we (moodle.org) distribute them in a single package with the GPL'ed code, we require them to be GPL compatible.

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In reply to David Mudrák

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Gareth J Barnard -
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Fonts are listed here: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#Fonts - I do use OFL SIL fonts which I've found to be ok.  However as they are a separate entity then the whole 'plugin' part of GPLv3 which applies to Moodle plugins does not force GPLv3 on them even if they could be licensed that way.  Something to discuss / clarify in that to extend the Moodle policy that it has to be licensed under a 'free' licence for parts that cannot be covered by GPLv3 due to their type?

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In reply to Gareth J Barnard

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by David Mudrák -
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Yes, OFL SIL for fonts is ok. I just edited my previous post to be a bit more specific. Hope it's clear now.

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In reply to David Mudrák

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by David Mudrák -
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There is https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en.html#WhatDoesCompatMean with a clear explanation what "compatible license" means. In our case, the PHP code and other files are combined into one larger program (Moodle plugin in the ZIP file) and can be distributed as such "provided the combination is released under the same GNU GPL version".

That is why we say that Moodle plugins must be (as a whole) released under GPLv3. Some of their parts (like bundled JS libraries or media) can have their own licenses as long as they are compatible with GPLv3. Only then we can legally host and distribute them via moodle.org channels (including automatic updates).

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In reply to Markus Bopp

Re: Listing Themes That Have Commercial Extras

by Ray Lawrence -

I think the key point to remember is that you can't restrict the freedoms inherent in the GPL license.

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