Dear Sir, [adressed to licens...@fsf.org & g...@gcc.gnu.org]
[I assume you understand both GPL vs GFDL licenses & software architecture] I am a (write after approval) contributor to GCC, and the author of the MELT branch of GCC (on which I am working since 2008 at least). So far, I am the only contributor to that branch. I am covered by a copyright assigment RT206238 (from my employer CEA to FSF). I am not at all a lawyer, just a plain research engineer, computer scientist, working in a public French research organization (CEA, www.cea.fr, approximately the French variant of the US DOE) and I don't understand US particularities about licenses. I am French so do not understand, use or know US laws. In a few words, MELT is a lispy domain specific language, translated to C code suitable for GCC, to write extensions to GCC (so an extension coded in MELT is like a GCC plugin coded in C, except that the source code is in my MELT dialect, not in C, and that the API gluing the MELT extension to GCC is different & specific to MELT). MELT can be compiled in principle as a GCC branch, or -by fetching only a few files from the branch- it follows the GCC trunk (but I did not merge the trunk into MELT since several weeks, for technical reasons). MELT is bootstrapped, like GCC is. This means that the MELT translator is written in MELT and generates its own C files (obviously, these generated files are stored in the svn repository, exactly like generated configure files are also stored there). MELT [in the svn repository] is made of: a. a runtime, coded in C, files gcc/melt-runtime.[ch] plus some few changes w.r.t. gcc trunk in a few files (e.g. a few lines added to gcc/toplevel.c) b. the MELT translator, itself coded in MELT, files gcc/melt/warmelt*.melt. These files have the same copyright comment as every other GCC source file. c. The C files machine-generated from the above (b) files, in gcc/melt/generated/*.c. The copyright comment from (b) is mechanically copied in these files. d. extra MELT files illustrating some concrete extra GCC passes coded in MELT, files gcc/melt/xtra*melt e. an incomplete hand-written gcc/doc/melt.texi file documenting the branch. This is a chapter of the GCC internals documentation (like gcc/doc/gimple.texi is) and it is included from gccint.texi with @include melt.texi The MELT building procedure also generates in the build tree, from some annotations inside the (b) sources files gcc/melt/warmelt*melt, a file meltgendoc.texi; I asked on May 7th on the gcc list [in a detailed message] http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2010-05/msg00125.html for comments, but did not get any answers. Later on, in the http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2010-05/msg00539.html thread, I was told that generating a *texi file from (GPLv3+ licensed, FSF copyrighted) source code could be incompatible with the GFDL license of gccint.texi. More technical details appear in http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2010-05/msg00125.html so I won't repeat them here. In particular, there is a link (to an attachment on the GCC wiki) to the generated documentation in PDF. The main point is that MELT is quite a big code (for a single coder), and that the generated documentation, even if it is incomplete, buggy, is the only reference documentation I have. Generating documentation from source code is not a new practice (GTK did that for years). What do you suggest me to do? (I would hope that future versions of GPL or GFDL might permit generating document from source code, but they won't come out soon). Perhaps a solution could be to move all melt documentation outside of the GCC internals documentation in the MELT branch, and to have a meltdoc.texi documentation with a compatible license (someone suggest using GPL for a documentation) and have it include both melt.texi & meltgendoc.texi. I certainly don't want (and probably legally cannot) to change any license or copyright comment without permission probably from FSF (or who else?). Apparently, I was told that the current state of MELT documentation is that it might have a conflict between GPL & GFDL and therefore might not be redistributable, but I am not a lawyer at all and do not understand at all these issues. My wish would be to have a documentation which some linux distributions could provide & redistribute. I would be very sad to lose all my (incomplete) documentation efforts. I am waiting for your advices & would be happy to answer to any technical questions. But I am not a lawyer, and not even a native English speaker. Respectful regards. -- Basile STARYNKEVITCH http://starynkevitch.net/Basile/ email: basile<at>starynkevitch<dot>net mobile: +33 6 8501 2359 8, rue de la Faiencerie, 92340 Bourg La Reine, France *** opinions {are only mines, sont seulement les miennes} ***