AProZilla

This is a modified version of the former www.AproZilla.com web site.

Well, it's the end of an era. TurboPower has formally shut down effective 7 Jan 03. Read all about it at www.turbopower.com.  In anticipation of the inevitable questions, TurboPower has put together a FAQ at http://www.turbopower.com/faq/. I, personally, do not know all of the reasons why the TurboPower retail business was discontinued, but it's a done deal, and there's no point to going on and on about it. 

The APRO line of components (APRO (the VCL version), APAX (the ActiveX version), and APRO-CLX (the Kylix version) are all being released as open source through Source Forge. To answer the inevitable questions, we've set up a page showing how to get the projects here. Note that these projects are still in the approval process.

These will be released under the Mozilla 1.1 license. There seems to be a lot of confusion about this license, so you're highly encouraged to read the Mozilla 1.1 license. There's also a pretty thorough FAQ about this license at http://jvcl.sourceforge.net/licensing.htm (that's a Project Jedi site, another highly successful open source Delphi component thingy). In addition to the MPL (Mozilla Public License), APRO-CLX will be dual-licensed with the LGPL (Lesser General Public License) for use with the Open Edition of Kylix. Here are some of the questions (and answers) that I've seen lately, these are by no means legally binding, so bounce it off the actual license or your lawyer if you have doubts. (while you're at it, bounce a few heavy objects off your lawyer, such as a sofa)

Q: If I use APRO do I have to release the source to my program?
A: No, but according to section 3.6 you have to include a reference to the fact that the project is using this code and where they can get their very own copy of APRO. The reference can be in the documentation, readme file, help file, a license file, about box, basically anywhere that you'd expect to find licensing material.

Q: Can I create a commercial, closed-source application using APRO?
A: Yep, you just need to add the reference like above. The only thing that you'd have to have available is the reference.

Q: What's the biggest impact of using the MPL instead of the old TurboPower license?
A: There's really only two differences big enough to mention. The first is the reference alluded to above. The second is only a concern if you choose to modify the code. If you do, then you must feed those modifications back to the project. This is a good thing, the hard work that someone has put in to add a particular feature, or fix a bug, will be of benefit to the rest of the community. You should know that this applies to derivative work (modification to existing code) and not to new work (new, or completely rewritten, components).

Q: Since APRO-CLX is dual licensed (MPL and LGPL), how does that affect things?
A: Since it's dual licensed, you have the choice of which license to use. Kylix Open Edition uses LGPL, so you'd have to use LGPL for work done with that version, but you can use either MPL or LGPL for other versions of Kylix.

Q: Since it's open source, that means I can repackage APRO and sell it on my own, right?
A: Wrong. TurboPower still maintains the copyright to the library. You can still sell your own components that rely on the APRO code/components, but you can't sell APRO. You can also sell new work, but not derivatives.

Q: What's your favorite color?
A: Well, that depends. I like green or black for cars, for everything else I think it would be blue. After a quick survey of other developers, the favorite colors are purple and black, another vote for blue, and one for plaid.

Q: What did that last question have to do with APRO or MPL?
A: Nothing much. A lot of the questions that I've read about MPL are just as irrelevant. If you're just going to use APRO without modification, the only thing you have to do is add the reference as mentioned above. If you're going to modify APRO, then you'll have to provide those modifications to the project.