Re: GPL-licensed packages with depend-chain to OpenSSL
On Fri, Aug 13, 2004 at 12:59:00AM +0200, Freek Dijkstra wrote:
> Given the fact that this topic seems to come up relatively often, would it
> be a good idea to put a few things into a FAQ for people to refer to?
> In my opinion, it should be added to, or referred from either or both:
> http://people.debian.org/~bap/dfsg-faq.html
> http://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/
I don't think questions about the GPL belong in the DFSG FAQ. They belong
in the FSF's:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html
It doesn't clearly answer every common question; I'd recommend bringing your
suggestions of missing questions to the FSF for possible inclusion in their
FAQ. (I did try to refer to it during our discussion, but couldn't find in
it a clear answer to your questions, so it's either too short--doesn't have
the information--or too long, and I simply couldn't dig it out.)
They don't belong in Debian policy.
> Here is a quick draft:
> Q: How to find if a licence is 'free'?
> A: See http://www.nl.debian.org/legal/licenses/byclass
> Or http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html
Debian and the FSF have similar but different definitions of Free; Debian
should be pointing to the DFSG, not gnu.org. :)
> Q: Will the FSF sue me if I do this?
> A: No. First of all, since this is copyright law, only the copyright owner
> can sue you. That is sometimes the FSF, but often a group of open source
> developers. Even so, they probably don't have the resource to sue you.
> However, breaking the law is not the solution, even if it is injust in your
> opinion.
I'd recommend against making claims to what the FSF will or won't do.
(Remember, the FSF holds copyright to a large quantity of GPL-licensed
code.)
--
Glenn Maynard
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