> For legal reasons, we could not contribute directly (their patches)
What were the legal reasons?
What were the legal reasons?
> SQLite is open-source, meaning that you can make as many copies of it as you want and do whatever you want with those copies, without limitation. But SQLite is not open-contribution. In order to keep SQLite in the public domain and ensure that the code does not become contaminated with proprietary or licensed content, the project does not accept patches from people who have not submitted an affidavit dedicating their contribution into the public domain.
> All of the code in SQLite is original, having been written specifically for use by SQLite. No code has been copied from unknown sources on the internet.
They want to be freaking sure they are the original authors / they can release the code in the public domain.
Public domain is tricky and does not exist in the same way everywhere. Where I live, you just can't decide to put something in the public domain, you need to use something like CC0 [1]
[1] https://creativecommons.org/share-your-work/public-domain/cc...
Kind of weird, couldn't they use a CLA?
So if they've chosen a different risk model than essentially every other company doing open source software then that's up to them, but I'm not sure the need for it follows from it being public domain?
There's something specific about the public domain that in many places, you can't just decide to release something in the public domain. I guess that's why they actually accept contribution but require an affidavit dedicating the contribution into the public domain. IIUC an affidavit specifically needs to be witnessed by taker of oaths, which probably ensures that the work can indeed be put in public domain.
Not sure it's the whole story, or even the main reason, or the correct analyze, though.
FWIW, within the sqlite project we have a very strict policy against copy/paste of anything from outside sources. If we don't write it ourselves, it doesn't get added to the canonical source tree, no exceptions.