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Re: License requirements for DSP binaries?



On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 11:56:27AM +0200, Josselin Mouette wrote:
> Le lun 22/09/2003 à 09:46, Glenn Maynard a écrit :
> > On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:47:26AM +0200, Thomas Hood wrote:
> > > IBM distributes the Linux driver and the binaries in a tarball that
> > > it says is licensed under the GPL.
> > >      http://oss.software.ibm.com/acpmodem/
> > > No source code is provided for the DSP binaries.  (N.B., past
> > > discussions of this issue have reached the conclusion that such
> > > software can nevertheless be distributed in main.)

> > If it's licensed under the GPL, and no source is provided, then it can
> > not be distributed at all, not even in non-free, unless there never was
> > source to begin with.  (I assume this isn't the case, as you said "no
> > source code is provided", not "no source code exists".)

> If the binaries were entirely written using assembly code, the binary
> here equates the source.

assembly != machine language.  If it's written in assembly, the source
is still assembly, not a binary (despite assembly sometimes /appearing/
to be binary gibberish :).

-- 
Steve Langasek
postmodern programmer

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