On Thu, 11 May 2006, martin f krafft wrote: > also sprach Josselin Mouette <joss@debian.org> [2006.05.11.2219 +0200]: > > I think this is the whole point of licensing a library under the GPL. > > For me the point of a library is code reuse. Putting a library under > the GPL is more of a political statement. Preserving user freedom by requiring those who use your library comply with the GPL may be a political statement in part,[1] but then again, so is the entire Free Software movement. > > There's not much point in using a copyleft if you allow > > proprietary applications to use the library. > > I still see a difference between cut-n-paste and link-to-library > code reuse. > > From what I understand, if your product links to a GPL library, you > have to make it GPL as well. We analysed the situation back when we > wanted to make libhid Artistic and concluded that we cannnot do that > because it links against hidparser, which is GPL'd. If our analysis > was wrong, all the better... It doesn't have to be GPLed. It needs to be licenced in such a way that it is possible to comply with the GPL when you distribute a work which is a derivative of a GPLed work. This means that you need to either license your work under the GPL, or a license which is compatible with the GPL. [It also means that you'll need to provide your source code, but one would hope you were going to do that anyway.] Don Armstrong 1: I'd argue strongly that preserving user freedom is much more than a mere political statement, but then again, some will argue that preserving freedom of speech and expression is a political statement as well. Just because something is also political statement doesn't make it evil or wrong. -- Taxes are not levied for the benefit of the taxed. -- Robert Heinlein _Time Enough For Love_ p250 http://www.donarmstrong.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu
Attachment:
signature.asc
Description: Digital signature