The author of the Mypal web browser, which is a fork of Pale Moon for the Windows XP platform, announced the cessation of further development of the project at the request of the Pale Moon developers. This decision came after support for the OS ended with the release of Pale Moon 27.0.
The main complaint from the Pale Moon developers was that Feodor2, the developer of Mypal, did not provide the source codes for the specific release published as an executable file, suggesting that users look for the code in the GitHub repository from the time when the release was made. According to the Pale Moon developers, this violated the terms of the Mozilla Public License. As this incident was previously noted in 2019, the license is revoked immediately, and this time Feodor2 is unable to utilize the 30-day period for remedying violations provided in the MPL.
The MPL license clearly states that for the executable form of a product, information must be provided on how and where to obtain a copy of the source code form. The Pale Moon developers insist that posting a link to the master branch of a continuously updated repository is not equivalent to providing the product in source text form as required by the MPL license.
The supporters of Mypal argue that the accusations from Pale Moon are based on a misinterpretation of the MPL license, which is not violated, as the actual code changes are available in the repository, and the license requirements for opening the code of derivative works are being met. Furthermore, the author of Mypal has taken the feedback into account and recently organized tagging for releases for identification in the repository (previously, builds were generated as snapshots of the continuously updated repository).
It is also worth noting that the cessation of Mypal's development marks the culmination of a long-standing conflict between the project’s author and M. Tobin, one of the lead developers of Pale Moon. Last year, M. Tobin succeeded in blocking users of the Mypal fork from accessing the 'addons.palemoon.org' add-ons directory due to dissatisfaction with the fact that the fork's developers were taking advantage of Pale Moon's infrastructure and using project resources without permission, without attempting to negotiate or find mutually beneficial cooperation.
Source: opennet.ru
