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Re: GPL-licensed packages with depend-chain to OpenSSL



Brian Thomas Sniffen <bts@alum.mit.edu> schrieb/wrote:
>> If we follow this interpretation, this means that you can't distribute
>> an closed source OS with GPL tools. IMO, this was not the intention of
>> the GPL authors. If you have to distribute the component with the GPL
>> software, this is a sign that it's not universally available on the
>> operating system. However, if you are distributing an OS...

> That was *exactly* the intent of the GPL authors: to prevent Sun from
> distributing the GNU tools with Solaris.  They do distribute them
> separately.

They did. Solaris 9 reportedly comes with GNU tools (I can't check it
myself because I don't have a machine running Solaris).

I can't find anything on the FSF's homepage that says you can't distri-
bute GNU tools with non-GPL operating systems. Further, I can't find an
official statement saying: Sun and Apple (Max OS X also comes with GNU
tools, according to Apple's homepage) violate the GPL.

Further, you can't just interpret a contract (license?) according to the
intent of RMS or the FSF. Legal construction is more complex than that
(and unfortunatly, the rules vary from legislation to legislation).

>> Well, we should not think: "openssl accompanies $tool-ssl" but:
>> "$tool-ssl accompanies Debian which also includes openssl (or a
>> compatible SSL library)".

> Silly syntax games don't help anything:

If you dismiss any attempt to interpret the phrase "accompanies the
executable" as "syntax games", we can just stop the discussion.

> the author put it under the GPL because he *didn't* want it shipped
> with software with restrictions like OpenSSL's.

I see: Someone releasing a program written in curl under the GPL does
not want it to be distributed along with an operating system that
includes the curl runtime.
No, most authors would probably be very surprised that there is such a
problem at all.

Of course, in such simple cases, they can be thought of having given
implicit permission to link against OpenSSL.
The hard cases are those where you have different choices for a library
and only one choice links against a non-GPL-compatible library.

Claus
-- 
http://www.faerber.muc.de




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