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I am using a helpful project that is licensed under the LGPL3.
I have taken some of the useful code out of it and refactored it into a wrapper class and would like to add it to an upstream project.
As I understand it, my refactored code would count as a derivative work.
However, the upstream project is licensed under Apache 2.0.
Does the LGPL license from the original project mean that I can't contribute the refactored code to the upstream project?
Since your code is derived from the LGPLv3 code you are bound by that license – it is a copyleft license like the GPLv3, just with a linking exception. You do not have the right to license this code under the Apache 2 license.
While Apache 2 and LGPLv3 are compatible, license compatibility is a one-way street: you can include Apache 2 licensed code in a LGPLv3 project, but not LGPLv3 licensed code in a Apache 2 project.
But the LGPLv3 offers a linking exception: the license of linked code doesn't matter if the relevant LGPL terms are still complied with. For example, the Apache 2 licensed project could use your software as a dynamically linked library without any impact on licensing. However, when binaries of the Apache 2 licensed project are distributed it would have to be accompanied by the source code of your software.
