ERPNext Conference 2016: Registeration and Call for Presentations

[neilLasrado]

@IAGAdmin We would love to have you at the conference. Also you can give a talk about the customizations etc you are working on. What error did you get while registering ? Just drop me a email on support@erpnext.com

[vrms]

thanks for your feedback. I was not asking for anyone to explain it to me here (even though your elaborations are welcome) but rather suggested a topic for a talk on the conference about this by someone who is knowledgeable enough to deliver such though.

Ideally such a person was an ‘outsider’ who had not stakes in this in any way (in my eyes).

@ganas

… changing Frappe framework to a GPL license you basically asking to destroy its potential to be used for great things and build more different application. and you will be only limiting frappe framework for ErpNext use. Its basically a suicide for the farmework outside ErpNext realm

thanks for sharing that opinion. Just to be clear … I was not suggesting changing anything (in case you sensed that). I was suggesting a topic which I find to be worth clarifying about (my guess 90% of users and 70% of developers are not 100% clear about what the licenses permit or what they restrict).

So it’s good to read your comments on that (which sound profound enough to believe them to be correct to me).

My friend I think you have big misunderstanding between framework and App

no, I don’t think I have

ErpNext -> web app built using frappe-> it’s the core product of the team and have sophisticated business logic. So the app itself is licensed under GPL license so any edit to its source code it has to open sourced.

with one exception I believe … anyone can add functionality to ERPNext using an external App.
Any external App can be proprietary if the authors decide it to be. Therefore it is a possible scenario to have the opencore ERPNext plus additional functionality which is proprietary.

And that (given your explanations above are correct) would be completely legal as per the licenses of Frappe & ERPNext.

[ganas]

First sorry for assuming you don’t know the difference between Framework and App, but I hope the post will help someone who doesn’t

@vrms

I was suggesting a topic which I find to be worth clarifying about (my guess 90% of users and 70% of developers are not 100% clear about what the licenses permit or what they restrict).

Frappe team didn’t write the GPL or MIT licence they adapted them. Those licenses are public any one can read and research and even learn about their loopholes. Any good developer must have knowledge of licenses out there, so its the job of the developer and the user to educate themselves and learn requirements and obligations of each license. simple google search or youtube videos are sufficient to have understanding of different licenses.

@vrms

anyone can add functionality to ERPNext using an external App.

Thats true because GPL doesn’t say anything about static or dynamic linking. but any way there is just much you can do with external apps and mostly case specific modification that doesn’t help generic erp.

Also, keep in mind, there is already a loophole in GPL license in which if you are not distributing your code then you don’t need to release your code. For example, if you are a erpnext hosting provider and just offer a service then you don’t need to release your code since you are not distributing code but service. This loophole is closed in AGPL licence but AGPL didn’t prevent Odoo from going proprietary, and many companies around the world prohibit its developers from linking to AGPL code is it require open sourcing the linked programs. Whats good about ErpNext is that all developers are contributing in good faith because every one knows that popularity of ErpNext will help all.

[vrms]

@ganas

sorry for assuming you don’t know the difference between Framework and App, but I hope the post will help someone who doesn’t

no worries … actually it helped me a lot and probably will help others. I really appreciate it.

Frappe team didn’t write the GPL or MIT licence, they are public license any one can read and research and even learn about their loopholes. Any good developer must have knowledge of licenses out there, so its the job of the developer and the user to educate themselves and learn requirements and obligations of each license.

I tend to see that from a different angle … we (Frappe Ltd as well as the Community) are interested that ERPNext (incl bench, Frappe) evolves and grows … so you could say we could think about how to enable such growth and developments.

An assumption: a huge majority of the code comes directly from employees of Frappe Ltd ?. Now one could think to enable a community to contribute more and more would be a basic interest of Frappe Ltd AND the community itself. based on that one could get the idea that to provide a good infrastructure (knowlede how to code AND knowledge about the legal framework) would be a good way to enable more contributions from the community … that’s what I am firing at.

here is my hypothesis
Every hour or $ invested into such an infrastructure (or framework if you want) returns code worth ‘X’ hrs/$ while every $ invested into direct coding returns you code worth exactly 1$ … I guess you get my drift here.
Naturally you have to strive for ‘X’ being > 1 in order to turn this in the right direction. And clarity about license reality is a big plus (or minus if it doesn’t exist) in this regards.

@ganas

Whats good about ErpNext is that all developers are contributing in good faith because every one knows that popularity of ErpNext will help all.

that sounds nice, but (no offense intended) … is a bit naive maybe? I am sure that’s the same everybody felt about the odoo universe before it changed.