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Bug#183860: Many texi files under GFDL use texinfo.tex under GPL



On Wed, Dec 24, 2003 at 10:18:19AM -0500, Richard Stallman wrote:
>     Many (all?) GNU texinfo manuals that are licensed under the GFDL do an:
> 
> 	    \input texinfo
> 
>     According to the comments at the top of texinfo.tex, texinfo is 
>     licensed under the GPL, version 2 or later.
> 
> The texinfo.tex file is an implementation of Texinfo.
> Documents written in Texinfo can be licensed in any fashion;
> they do not have to be licensed under the GPL.

I'm sorry, but I am little confused.  GNU readline is one implementation
of the readline interface, which has also been implemented in the
"editline" library, as I recall.

But the FSF has objected in the past to programs which used the readline
API being licensed in a manner incompatible with the GNU GPL (I believe
I am thinking of ncftp in this instance[1]).

Can you help me to understand the distinction between an executable
using a shared library (which is functional material) and a TeX file
using macros defined by another TeX file (which is also functional
material)?

Thanks for your time, and happy holidays.

[1] http://mail.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-grub/2000-11/msg00049.html

-- 
G. Branden Robinson                |
Debian GNU/Linux                   |      If encryption is outlawed, only
branden@debian.org                 |      outlaws will @goH7Ok=<q4fDj]Kz?.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |

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