The European Union’s open source licence EUPL is currently under revision, aiming to make it compatible with the GPLv3, AGPLv3 and other licences.

A public consultation has just started, with the publication of a first draft and a background document on some of the proposed changes. Both the original development of the EUPL and the current revision are supported through the European Commission programmes to foster interoperability: ISA and its predecessor programmes IDABC and IDA.

«We are updating the licences to remove barriers that could hinder others in the open source communities from using software licensed under the EUPL. Making it explicitly compatible with the GPLv3 should increase interoperability», explains Patrice-Emmanuel Schmitz, a Brussels-based legal specialist working involved in the drafting of the EUPL.

The first version of the EUPL was published in 2007. It allows others to re-use the software and to improve and share the code. The licence takes into account both the EU law and that of the EU Member States. Starting with version 1.1, published in 2009, the EUPL is available in 22 official linguistic versions that have identical legal value.

Full article at: http://ec.europa.eu/isa/news/2012/eupl_en.htm