[Libreoffice-qa] Bug 59481 - FILEOPEN: Linux rpm: Native MySQL-connector aoo-my-sdbc-1.1.0 didn't work any more with LO 4.0

[Lionel Elie Mamane]

On Sat, Jan 19, 2013 at 11:17:20AM -0500, Terrence Enger wrote:
> On Fri, 2013-01-18 at 08:04 -0800, Joel Madero wrote:

>> Can someone triage this one? Thanks in advance!

> And there has been quit a bit of subsequent discussion.

> I wonder just what Lionel was proposing [1] after the announcement
> [2] of changed licence for the mariadb / mysql client library.

I was commenting that for LibreOffice, this is not sufficient. We, as
a project, have decided not to ship (binaries compiled from) GPL
code in our main product, that is LibreOffice (we do "ship" GPL code
that does not end up in LibreOffice, e.g. in
http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/contrib/dev-tools/tree/make-3.82-gbuild
).

The MySQL native (SDBC) connector is made as follows::

 MySQL SDBC connector itself (SISSL / Apache / LGPL licence,
                              depending on version)
using
 MySQL Connector/C++ (GPL)
using
 MySQL Connector/C (AKA libmysql or client Library) (GPL)


Swapping out the MariaDB client library for the MySQL client library
brings the picture to:

 MySQL SDBC connector itself
using
 MySQL Connector/C++ (GPL)
using
 libmariadb (LGPL)

So still not OK for integration into LibreOffice proper, because still
a GPL component.

For us to be able to ship the MySQL SDBC connector (with our current
self-imposed policy), one of these things has to be done:

1) Write an Apache/BSD/LGPL/... licensed "clone" of MySQL
   Connector/C++

OR

2) Change the MySQL SDBC connector to not need "MySQL Connector/C++",
   but use libmysql/libmariadb directly (these are API-compatible; we
   would ship with libmariadb, but if a downstream user would want to
   swap it with libmysql, technically there should be no problem)

But that's "only" *our* policy. Any third party can make a different
choice, and e.g. Debian has made another choice and *does* ship GPL
code, including the MySQL Connector/C++ and the MySQL SDBC connector
for use with LibreOffice. It is my understanding any such third party
would be allowed to upload the MySQL SDBC connector for use with
LibreOffice to extensions.libreoffice.org; I don't see on that website
a policy that forbids that. If any such third party would do that, at
least for Microsoft Windows and MacOS X, I believe it would make some
of our users happier.

> How would this compare in effort and benefit to the job of making
> the mysql extension work with LibreOffice 4.0?

The MySQL extension just needs to be compiled/linked against
LibreOffice 4.0; then it should work. No development work needed. Only
building (for GNU/Linux and MacOS (if necessary): on an OS install as
old as what the extension wants to be compatible with).

So, here's how "it" compares in effort and benefit, "it" being "the
stuff described in the ESC minutes that you linked to".

 - MUCH more work

 - MUCH more benefit, since it would allow the MySQL SDBC connector to
   be bundled with LibreOffice. I will *gladly* review a patch that
   does that!

> Just by the way, does this change of licence return mysql to
> consideration for LO's built-in database [4]?

No, because this is only the client library, not the database engine
itself. For our embedded database, we want to ship a database
engine. The database engine is still GPL. Be it MySQL or MariaDB.

-- 
Lionel