Re: elvis package
In article <[🔎] Pine.LNX.3.96.980420135209.25170C-100000@blaakmeer.student.utwente.nl> you write:
>On Fri, 17 Apr 1998, Martin Schulze wrote:
>
>> This might look confusing but the situation is different as
>> the author of vile is aware of the unfreeness and distributes
>> new parts under the GPL.
>>
>> "the bulk of vile _cannot_ be covered by the GPL due to murky origins and
>> previous copyrights. however, the code that i have written (and i suspect
>> this is true of contributions made by others as well) was written to be
>> published, and to be shared with others. please respect this. see the top
>> of main.c for the restrictions put on the original MicroEMACS code upon
>> which vile was based."
[...]
>
>I am not a license expert, but from the GPL I understand that if you make
>modifications to a program and you put the modifications under GPL, you
>have to put the entire program under GPL, no matter what the original
>license was. If the license of the original program doesn't allow this,
>you get an undistributable program.
>
>Can any license expert comment on this?
I'm not a licence expert either, but I have seen lots of discussion
about the effects of various licences both here and on usenet. ;-)
I'm pretty sure that a program must be either entirely GPLed,
or contain no GPLed parts. The only way around this would be to
separate the GPLed and non-GPLable code into separate programs with
a well-defined, documented interface, and even then it would likely
still be controvercial. The whole point of the GPL is to ensure that
you can't integrate non-GPLed parts into GPLed programs or vice-versa.
There was some discussion about a related issue on gnu.misc.discuss when
the NPL was being drafted. RMS wanted a clause in the NPL to allow NPLed
code to be converted to GPLed. This didn't materialise, thus it's now
illegal to incorporate GPLed code into Mozilla and distribute the result.
--
Charles Briscoe-Smith
White pages entry, with PGP key: <URL:http://alethea.ukc.ac.uk/wp?95cpb4>
PGP public keyprint: 74 68 AB 2E 1C 60 22 94 B8 21 2D 01 DE 66 13 E2
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