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So I wish to take some lead in development of my app based on projects that were not active for 4 and 2 years. One of them is MIT licensed and other has AGPL-3 license. If I were to add my own code for UI and merge both projects into single github repository:

  1. Should I keep both their licenses(MIT and AGPL-3) files.
  2. Should I license my own project under AGPL-3 license and if so then should I just copy their AGPL-3 license or create my own for my code and as well keep their for their part of code.
  3. Licenses will be in respectfull folder with names of each project on them so that is enought, I gues?
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    Please edit the question to limit it to a specific problem with enough detail to identify an adequate answer.
    – Community Bot
    Commented Apr 27 at 9:35

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  1. Should I keep both their licenses(MIT and AGPL-3) files.

Yes. Even when additional terms are applied when redistributing, the MIT license text still needs to be included. The AGPL is even easier, because it doesn't allow different terms.

  1. Licenses will be in respectfull folder with names of each project on them so that is enought, I gues?

Yes, that is sufficient to indicate the license of the dependency.

  1. Should I license my own project under AGPL-3 license and if so then should I just copy their AGPL-3 license or create my own for my code and as well keep their for their part of code.

As you have an AGPL dependency, the entire project needs to be distributed under the AGPL (or GPL) license to comply with the AGPL license. The easiest way is to use the (A)GPL license also for your code. That license should be located where other developers look for it, which means you should have a copy of it in the main folders of your project and not depend on people finding it within a dependency.

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  • "As you have an AGPL dependency, your project also needs to use the AGPL license. " - If the author is bringing in other MIT code already, why is it not OK to also apply the MIT license to author's new code that she is including ? This part is not clear in your answer.
    – Brandin
    Commented Apr 29 at 7:25
  • @Brandin, better now?
    – Bart van Ingen Schenau
    Commented Apr 29 at 8:11
  • @BartvanIngenSchenau I think AGPL requires redistribution under AGPL only; GPL isn't an option. Do you read it differently?
    – MadHatter ♦
    Commented Apr 29 at 8:18
  • Probably technically it needs to be "compatible" with AGPL. I.e. what you said is probably technically correct "it's the easiest way" - but obviously code in there 'can' still be some other license like MIT as long as your distribution is done in a compatible way with AGPL.
    – Brandin
    Commented Apr 29 at 8:40
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    The way I understand it is that if your project contains 3rd party GPL code and 3rd party AGPL code, you may distribute the project under a mixed licence: the previously-GPL bits under GPL, and the previously-AGPL bits under AGPL. AGPLv3 s13 is pretty clear about that, in its last sentence. If your interpretation (as I understand it) were right, I could file the AGPL down to GPL simply by combining an AGPL work with some small-but-copyrightable piece of code that I release under GPL.
    – MadHatter ♦
    Commented Apr 29 at 15:04

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