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Legal rights, law etc

hardphazehardphaze
edited July 2017 in General Discussion

Hello,

Im new to processing and Im interested in using it in my profession as well. Question is; is it "ok" to make a profit with the help of processing? Of course my ambition is to donate some of the profit if it should ever start going plus on my bankaccount :) but that doesn't solve this does it?

Regards // Hardphaze

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  • jeremydouglassjeremydouglass
    Answer ✓

    @hardphaze --

    The Processing development environment is released as open source under the GPL. The export libraries (also known as 'core') are released under an LGPL license, which means they can be used as a library and included in your project without you having to open up your code (though we encourage people to share anyway). But if you make changes to core, you have to submit back to us. -- https://github.com/processing/processing/wiki/FAQ

    Yes, you can make things with Processing and sell them. For example, you can search the forums for recent discussions of Android apps made with processing that are for sale in the Android marketplace.

  • Lord_of_the_GalaxyLord_of_the_Galaxy

    @jeremydouglass That brings another question - do I need to disclose source of any program I make with Processing? If so (I don't really mind, as I'm not interested in profits), what and all must be included?

  • GoToLoopGoToLoop

    https://www.Reddit.com/r/processing/comments/682x6k/question_about_processing_corejar_license/

  • jeremydouglassjeremydouglass
    edited May 2017

    "do I need to disclose source of any program I make with Processing"

    No, you don't. You just need to comply with the LGPL requirements. See for example this discussion:

    https://softwareengineering.stackexchange.com/questions/86142/what-exactly-do-i-need-to-do-if-i-use-a-lgpl-licenced-library

    "The key is this: consumer of product gets an application with an LGPL'd library. Can they make an improvement to the LGPL'd part and use the new improved version with the original product? If yes, then you've complied with the intended purpose of the LGPL."

    So if your closed-source application is distributed with Processing 3.2.3 core in such a way that a user could choose to drop in their own modified Processing 3.2.3b, or 3.3, or whatever, and if you have attribution to Processing and explain that changing out the library is possible, then you can distribute for profit closed source software that uses Processing core.

    So, say for example you made a closed-source app with Processing, but I'm color blind and I wanted to change the way that color functions behave in the Processing core. Under LGPL I am allowed and should be able to swap in my custom version of the Processing core to work with your app -- even if I had to pay for your app, and even if I can't see the source code of your app, or modify that code, you still have to let me modify the open library -- and tell me that the library exists, and is open, and where to do it. For example, if you app uses core.jar, and I can put a different core.jar in that app directory and it changes the way the app runs....

    However, if your app runs a checksum on core.jar then you are violating LGPL. I modified the open library, dropped it into your close-sourced app (which I paid for), and the app immediately stopped working by your design. You can't do that under LGPL.

  • Lord_of_the_GalaxyLord_of_the_Galaxy

    I see. Thanks @jeremydouglass!

  • hardphazehardphaze

    Thank you for answering my question =)!

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