I am not a lawyer, but just *using* the API (as a client) doesn't require any GPL'd code. You'd have problems if:

- You're *incorporating* the API (as a server) into your proprietary application. - You're using GPL'd client code. (Instead, you'll have to either write your own client code, or find existing client code that isn't GPL'd. If you have client code that you want to use, but it's GPL'd, it may have a single copyright holder, in which case you can contact him/her and see if (s)he's willing to cross-license his/her code to you, perhaps for a fee.)

-Ran Ari-Gur

On Wed, Oct 8, 2008 at 12:36 PM, Volz Raphael wrote:

Hi -

I am a bit unsure about whether it is OK to have an external application calling the MediaWiki API and being able to maintain that this application is proprietary.

Does usage of the API trigger the virality of GPL ?

We can work around by talking directly to MySQL instead, but using the REST API would be much more elegant and change resistant.

Thanks for your insights.

Thanks

Raphael

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Mediawiki-api mailing list Mediawiki-api@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/mediawiki-api

Volz Raphael wrote:

Hi -

I am a bit unsure about whether it is OK to have an external application calling the MediaWiki API and being able to maintain that this application is proprietary.

Does usage of the API trigger the virality of GPL ?

We can work around by talking directly to MySQL instead, but using the REST API would be much more elegant and change resistant.

Thanks for your insights.

Thanks

Raphael

I concur with the above. Using the API doesn't trigger the GPL virality. You're doing inter-process communication via sockets over a well-known format as XML or JSON. See http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#MereAggregation

However, that may not be the case if you're using FauxRequest to call the API within the same PHP instance which loads Mediawiki.