On 2/11/07, David Chisnall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
GPL'd applications are fine, since they enrich the user experience but don't tie developers to the GPL for their own code unless they contribute directly to that application. The situation is slightly blurred when it comes to components; I haven't read the GPL (v2) for a few years, so I'm not sure exactly how it relates to loosely- coupled systems. I suspect it would be fine since it only relates to distribution, and components would be composed by the end user (the GPL can't restrict this without violating the FSF's zeroth freedom), although GPLv3 has a few EULA-like conditions that might make this a problem.
That's the whole problem -- even if I believe that the GPL would be in effect non-enforceable in the case of loosely-coupled components (which basically is what our applications themselves will be, if we succeed in our goals), I prefer to use the LGPL as it's _explicitely_ non-enforceable and offer the same protection as the GPL, but only for the component/application/library themselves. Of course BSD licences do not pose a problem, but I like the (L)GPL. It's just that the GPL isn't that clear for loosely-coupled architectures, so better be safe and privilege the LGPL (or BSD) when we can.
David I-am-not-an-IP-lawyer-but-I-play-one-on-the-Internet
:D
[1] The Apple Objective-C runtime is APSL'd, and I am half-tempted to suggest that we import it, although not very loudly.
That could be interesting, yes.. particularly if we continue the livecd/custom system way, we could possibly compile the apple gcc + apple runtime in the future -- the main advantage would be the availability of some of the niceties apple added. But I'm not sure how much work it would need, and in the short term, it's probably not our main concern. -- Nicolas Roard "La perfection, ce n'est pas quand il n'y a plus rien à ajouter, c'est quand il n'y a plus rien à retrancher." -- Antoine de St-Exupéry _______________________________________________ Etoile-dev mailing list [email protected] https://mail.gna.org/listinfo/etoile-dev
