scientific license - fedora compatible?

[Patrice Dumas]

> Not that it should be taken as authority, but wikipedia has this to
> say about gnuplot:
> 
> The program is distributed under a license which permits copying and
> modification of the source code. However, modified versions are only
> allowed to be distributed as patch files: as such, the gnuplot licence
> is not compatible with the GPL, and is not free software (according to
> FSF, DFSG, and OSI).

That's strange. It seems to me that this practice is explicitly taken into
account in the point 4. at
http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php

    Accordingly, an open-source license must guarantee that source be 
    readily available, but may require that it be distributed as pristine 
    base sources plus patches. In this way, "unofficial" changes can be 
    made available but readily distinguished from the base source.



In my opinion the CCPL licence isn't a free software licence, because
it restricts the use (only for academic use) and oblige to send back the
patches within one year and transfer the copyright, not because the 
differences have to be distributed as patches.

--
Pat