On Aug 18, 2010, at 10:43 AM, Bob Friesenhahn <bfrie...@simple.dallas.tx.us> wrote:
> On Wed, 18 Aug 2010, Joerg Schilling wrote: >> >> Linus is right with his primary decision, but this also applies for static >> linking. See Lawrence Rosen for more information, the GPL does not distinct >> between static and dynamic linking. > > GPLv2 does not address linking at all and only makes vague references to the > "program". There is no insinuation that the program needs to occupy a single > address space or mention of address spaces at all. The "program" could > potentially be a composition of multiple cooperating executables (e.g. like > GCC) or multiple modules. As you say, everything depends on the definition > of a "derived work". > > If a shell script may be dependent on GNU 'cat', does that make the shell > script a "derived work"? Note that GNU 'cat' could be replaced with some > other 'cat' since 'cat' has a well defined interface. A very similar > situation exists for loadable modules which have well defined interfaces > (like 'cat'). Based on the argument used for 'cat', the mere injection of a > loadable module into an execution environment which includes GPL components > should not require that module to be distributable under GPL. The module > only needs to be distributable under GPL if it was developed in such a way > that it specifically depends on GPL components. This is how I see it as well. The big problem is not the insmod'ing of the blob but how it is distributed. As far as I know this can be circumvented by not including it in the main distribution but through a separate repo to be installed afterwards, ala Debian non-free. -Ross _______________________________________________ zfs-discuss mailing list zfs-discuss@opensolaris.org http://mail.opensolaris.org/mailman/listinfo/zfs-discuss
