[Rd] R on the Cydia Store

Duncan Murdoch murdoch.duncan at gmail.com
Tue Dec 9 22:34:00 CET 2014


On 09/12/2014, 4:26 PM, Marc Schwartz wrote:
> 
>> On Dec 9, 2014, at 10:44 AM, Henrik Bengtsson <hb at biostat.ucsf.edu> wrote:
>>
>> On Dec 9, 2014 6:38 AM, "Apps Embedded" <apps.embedded at gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> We have published an Android app called R Console on the Play Store since
>>> Décember 2013.
>>> https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appsopensource.R
>>> https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.appsopensource.Rpremium
>>>
>>> In the mean time, we have developped its equivalent app for the App Store.
>>> We released it on march 2014. We have been approved from this date by Apple
>>> to publish it world wide.
>>> Recently, we learnt that GPL app are not compatible with the App Store
>>> distribution licence.
>>
>> What I would like to write here, would fall under "this is certainly
>> not a topic for R devel", so I refrain.
>>
>> However, I can say that it's likely your problems wouldn't have stopped there;
>>
>> [R] R on the iPhone/iPad? Not so much....a GPL violation
>> https://stat.ethz.ch/pipermail/r-help/2010-June/240901.html
>>
>> /Henrik
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I might add that, given the intentions expressed below, in terms of doing this on a jailbroken iOS device via Cydia, the concerns raised in the Apple iOS SDK, that I referenced in the above linked post from 2010, essentially go away. 
> 
> They would still be germane, as may now be expressed in the current SDK, including the use of the new Swift language, if the OP's intent was to pursue this via official AppStore channels and am surprised that it was approved by Apple previously given the indicated content and functionality of the app.
> 
> The primary intention of jailbreaking an iOS device is, of course, to circumvent Apple's restrictions on the software that can be installed by using third party distribution channels and in the tools that can be used to develop apps.
> 
> That being said, the licensing issues, as Duncan raised in his reply, are still germane and permission from the R Foundation should be sought for any uses involving R Foundation copyrighted content. That would be relevant for both the iOS implementation and the Android implementation.

Just to be clear:  everybody already has permission from the R copyright
holders to use R within the existing licenses.  There's no need to seek
extra permission for that.

Trademarks are different...

Duncan Murdoch

> Regards,
> 
> Marc Schwartz
> 
> P.S. I echo's Duncan's comment, in that I am also a member of the R Foundation, but am not speaking here on it's behalf.
> 
> 
>>
>>>
>>> Thus we decided to remove the iOS app from the App Store several days ago.
>>>
>>> We are thinking of publishing the same app published under Cydia with a
>>> freemium model.
>>> Its licence would be GPL v3.
>>>
>>> What we would like to do under Cydia with R Console is to have the
>>> following behavior :
>>> - free version will be able to run recommended packages and graphics are
>>> not enabled. A small ad banner is present on top of the app.
>>> - premium version will be the same as the free version except the ad banner
>>> will not be present anymore and 3 compilers will be integrated into the app
>>> in order to be able to compile and run most of the Cran packages from
>>> source.
>>> - graphics may be added in a second step.
>>>
>>> The app will be considered as a bundle of open-source tools. This bundle
>>> will be under the Gnu General Public Licence version 3. Each open-source
>>> tool which contributes to the overall bundle will stay in its original
>>> licence (R is GPL v2 for instance) but the bundle will be GPL v3.
>>>
>>>
>>>> From your point of view, do you see any legal issue with this project under
>>> Cydia for jailbroken iOS devices?
>>>> From a trademark point of view, is the name of the apps "R Console Free"
>>> and "R Console Premium" ok ?
>>>
>>> Thanks for your help.
>>>
>>> Apps Embedded Team.
>



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