Re: Netatalk and OpenSSL licencing
On Tue, Aug 10, 2004 at 12:06:39AM +0200, Freek Dijkstra wrote:
> >> However, that being said, I claim it does not apply to this particular
> >> scenario! In this case, I suggested to distributed a binary of netatalk,
> >> including the UAMS linked with OpenSSL under GPL. To see if this is allowed
> >> you have to look at the *OpenSSL-licence*, NOT at the *GPL*.
> >
> > This is incorrect. It is the GPL which is being violated, not the OpenSSL
> > license.
>
> Huh. Why?
>
> I propose to built netatalk (with GPL licence) against OpenSSL (a non-GPL
> licence) and distribute the whole with the GPL licence. How does that
> violate the GPL?
You can't distribute the whole under the GPL. You must adhere to the OpenSSL
license *and* the GPL, since the binary you're distributing combines both.
In order to distribute a binary under the GPL, you must grant a license
to the entire work under the terms of the GPL (see GPL section 6). That
includes all code being used, regardless of what technology is being used
to bind that stuff together (static linking, dynamic linking). However,
you can't do that; you don't have permission to grant me a license to
OpenSSL under those terms. Therefore, you can't comply with GPL#6, and
so you can't distribute the binary.
> PS: I took this off-list, since I have the impression people get bored by
> this topic. Feel free to respond on-list though!
I'd prefer to keep things on the list. Although this is a repeat topic, it's
more productive to repeat it where others can read it, so if, for example, we
happen to come up with any nice, succinct explanations, they can be referred
to the next time the topic comes up.
Also, it's possible that I may not personally be able to explain everything;
it's fairly common to not be able to figure out exactly where misunderstandings
are. If we keep the discussion public, it's possible that somebody else
will figure it out.
Don't worry too much about people getting bored with a topic; if people
really don't want to bother with it, they'll stop reading it. I'll be
upfront, though: this is a very well-understood topic and you're not raising
any new arguments, so I don't see any possibility that this discussion will
change conclusions or policies. However, I do believe that one of the
secondary uses of this list is to help people better understand free software
licensing issues--insofar as us phony non-lawyers can possibly hope to, at
least--and so I think this type of discussion is useful (within reason).
(Obviously, IANAL, TINLA, etc.)
--
Glenn Maynard
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