On Thu, Sep 09, 2004 at 10:55:38PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote: > (b) The method is what must be analyzed, not the end result. As a > trivial example, take the end result of having Microsoft Windows > installed on a PC. A legal contraption to do that would be to go to > your local computer store and buy a copy. An illegal contraption to > do that would be Kazaa. > > As an example, I think distributing a package which downloaded FOO > source code and compiles it --- on the user's machine --- with OpenSSL > might be fine, as we'd be distributing under GPL 2 (or even GPL 1), and > GPL 2 doesn't require source to all modules contained in the program > (only to the program and works based on it, which OpenSSL clearly > isn't).
The GPL requires that all derived works be entirely available under the terms of the GPL. One piece of the resulting binary--OpenSSL--is not. This seems to clearly violate the spirit of the GPL. I don't know if the actual mechanism here is infringing. This is really just a case of the "distribute only source code, avoiding disributing binaries, to circumvent some of the GPL's requirements" "loophole", which we've discussed here several times, I think. I have no idea how this would fare in court, but I hope we agree that this would not be an acceptable thing for Debian to do. (I don't know if by "fine" you mean "legally fine" or "actually fine".) -- Glenn Maynard
