Open source content management system SugarCRM is switching to the new version of the GPL, the GPLv3, for the next release of their software.
SugarCRM is a dual-licensed open source application, with both open source versions and propriety versions which have additional functionality, support and other benefits. By releasing the low-end community version for free under the GPLv3, SugarCRM enables users to use the software in small businesses, small projects and non-mission critical roles. When those businesses and projects grow, and when those roles become mission critical, users can upgrade to the propriety versions of the software. The community version is released under the GPLv3, forcing commercial competitors who seek to build competing products on it to release the source-code to any improvements they make, leaving SugarCRM in a privileged position over any such competitors.
The GPLv3 is a third version of Gnu Public Licence released by the Free Software Foundation. The previous two versions have been very popular open source licences.
The acrimonious debate over earlier drafts of the GPLv3 threw up questions of how popular it would be once released, but take-up by high-profile projects such as SugarCRM suggest that the GPLv3 is going to enjoy popular support as the previous versions of the GPL have.
Actually, this move by SugarCRM is even more significant.
The upcoming release (not the current release) will be made available under the GPLv3. The current release is not open source. It is available under a community licence, not the GPLv2 as stated in this post, Sugar described this as “Sugar Open Source”. The Open Source Initiative always maintained that SugarCRM was not open source.
At this time the GPLv3 licence is not approved by the OSI. Consequently, Sugar is still not open source. However, the OSI are currently considering the GPLv3 for certification and it is hard to see why they would reject it, it is merely a matter of giving the community and the legal teams time to evaluate the licence.
This move by Sugar sees them finally coming to terms with the fact that it is far better for a company to adopt a recognised open source licence if they want to engage with the developer community.
Article corrected. Thanks for pointing that out.
could also work for vtiger ?