Re: A simple mistake (was Re: Should we ship KDE in hamm?)
On Fri, 24 Jul 1998, Oliver Elphick wrote:
> Raul Miller wrote:
> >Oliver Elphick <olly@lfix.co.uk> wrote:
> >> In the third case, the distinction between dynamic and static linking
> >> is irrelevant.
> >
> >It's always irrelevant. The GPL makes no mention of static vs. dynamic
> >linking. Whatever is true for dynamic linking is therefore true for
> >static linking.
>
> No!
>
> If you are looking at a legal document, you MUST look at what it actually
> says. Since the GPL does not mention static versus dynamic linking, one
> must see what it actually does say, which I analysed two or three posts
> back. You have ignored this.
Actually, it's a little more bizarre than you think, Oliver.
Instinctively, I am inclined to agree with you on dynamic libraries - that
they are not really 'part of a software work'. However, it has been made
clear many times - including by RMS, who does understand the GPL fairly
well - that law does not distinguish between static and dynaminc linking
(indeed, obviously law knows nothing of these technical details) and
*furthermore* that dynamic linking *is* considered a violation of the GPL
in cases like this.
I'm sorry that I can't provide a reference for you for this, but I
understand it to be an 'established fact' in some sense that the only way
to avoid this constraint is to demonstrate the existence of an
API-compatible dynamic library which could replace the offending one (qt,
in this case). Since even harmony probably won't be binary compatible,
this is unlikely to happen. (Of course, a source compatible harmony is
good enough, we then just make sure we compile debian QT packages with
harmony not QT).
>
> >> But, as I pointed out, clause 2 only applies to modifications; we do not
> >> modify KDE in any way.
> >
> >That's not true, when uncompressed the diffs against kdebase are about
> >160k.
>
> The point was, that the KDE Debian maintainer is part of the KDE team and
> the KDE debs are those published by KDE. WE, Debian, do not alter them.
We do, of course, guarantee the right to modify them, by distributing them
under the GPL. As you point out, this is not within our rights (we're not
the coyright holders). However, by even appearing to our users to be
guaranteeing this, I think we are 'doing wrong'.
> >Also, I believe that under copyright law adding to a copyrighted work is
> >considered to be a modification of that work. But I am not a lawyer and
> >it's possible that I'm wrong on this point.
> >
> >> You have separated the second part of my posting (which refers to the
> >> general problems of applying the GPL when modifying other people's
> >> code) and made it apply to KDE, to which I made it clear it does not
> >> apply.
> >
> >I think you need to check a few more facts.
>
> Raul, please read my previous post more carefully.
>
> The fact is, that the GPL is not particularly well drafted and definitely
> needs revision in the light of new developments in software technology.
A little more respect might be appropriate. The GPL is a very clever
document, and a great deal of thought and work was put into it. I do
agree with you that it doesn't deal very clearly with modern modularised
techniques, though.
Jules
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| Jules aka | jules@debian.org | Richmond, Surrey |
| Julian Bean | jmlb2@hermes.cam.ac.uk | TW9 2TF *UK* |
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