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I'm finishing up a Java JSON parser that I want to release under the LGPL 3.0 license. Thing is, I'm using JUnit 5 for unit tests (falls under the Eclipse 2.0 license), and some Apache Commons code for comparing doubles and string replacement (are under the Apache License 2.0). The unit tests appear in a single file, as does the commons code (in a different file). I'm not sure exactly what to do, this is my first FOSS project and all these licenses are very confusing for me. I would appreciate it if someone could guide me on what exactly I need to do to comply with all 3 licenses.

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I want to release under the LGPL 3.0 license

Okay, what this means is that all code you use must be compatible with the LGPL v3.0. For the purposes of this discussion, we can consider compatibility with the GPL v3.0 as the LGPL v3.0 is the GPL v3.0 with additional permission clauses.

The Apache 2.0 license is definitely compatible with the GPL v3.0 so you're fine there. You must of course obey the requirements of the license, in particular those in Section 4 "Redistribution".

The Eclipse 2.0 license is not compatible with the GPL v3.0. However, due to the weak copyleft nature of the the Eclipse license, your code is not covered by the Eclipse license unless you have actually modified anything in JUnit itself (which is unlikely).

Therefore I believe you can do this. Usual disclaimer about trusting anything you are told by a random on the Internet applies.

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  • Someone from Eclipses answered a query I'd sent earlier to them. They had this to say: I am not a lawyer and nothing here should be considered legal advice. It is common practice to have a LICENSE file in your project that describes the license of the project content. In this case, the JUnit content is a dependency, not project code. It's common practice to provide information about the licences of dependencies in a NOTICES file or in an SBOM. If you want actual legal advice, you should check with your lawyer/barrister. ~~~~~ Where would I look into doing this NOTICES file thing?
    – Yehuda Broderick
    Commented Mar 21 at 21:36

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