Re: Updating the fis-gtm package to V6.2-000

[Thorsten Alteholz <debian-med@alteholz.de>]

Hi Bhaskar,

On Thu, 2 Oct 2014, Bhaskar, K.S wrote:
> [KSB] Those *openssl* files are versions of the reference implementation of
> the plugin compiled with #include, #if, etc. configured to call call
> OpenSSL.  They are not actually linked to OpenSSL or other libraries -
> linking happens dynamically. 

Oh, come on, why should it matter whether you are linking at compile 
time or at run time? In both cases the result is a combined binary.

> kbhaskar@bhaskark:~$ ls -l
> /usr/lib/fis-gtm/V6.2-000_x86_64/plugin/lib*crypt*
> /usr/lib/fis-gtm/V6.2-000_x86_64/plugin/libgtmcrypt_openssl_AES256CFB.so
> -r-xr-xr-x 1 root root 40056 Sep 18 15:45
> /usr/lib/fis-gtm/V6.2-000_x86_64/plugin/libgtmcrypt_openssl_BLOWFISHCFB.so
> lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root    33 Sep 18 15:45
> kbhaskar@bhaskark:~$

Yes and when you look with ldd at libgtmcrypt_openssl* you see that libssl 
is needed.

> Most of the discussion of license interaction between copyleft and
> non-copyleft licenses at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License
> pertain to software used under non-copyleft licenses requesting services
> from (I deliberately avoid the use of "linking to") software used under
> non-copyleft licenses.  In this case, we have the reverse - a copyleft
> software (GT.M) requesting services from non-copyleft software (OpenSSL). 
> Regardless, it appears that there are different schools of thought on this.

Hmm, so why do you think that almost all GPL software that links to 
OpenSSL has a special OpenSSL exception? I am afraid such discussions have
been made frequently ...

>  *  Include a statement in the README that says something like: As dynamic
>     linking by the reference implementation of the plugin to software such
>     as cryptographic libraries that are released under non-copyleft licenses
>     is not considered to create a derivative work, there is no interaction
>     between the license used for GT.M and those of cryptographic libraries.
>  *  Remove any claim of copyright from the reference implementation of the
>     plugin (i.e., place the reference implementation in the public domain).
>  *  Remove the precompiled versions of the reference implementation of the
>     plugin from the distribution and include only the source of the plugin
>     (as I noted earlier, the GT.M binary distribution includes source code
>     for the reference implementation of the plugin).  Use the post-install
>     script to compile the reference implementation of the plugin.
>
> Thorsten, please let me know what you think.

I don't understand why you don't want to go the easy way? As you consider 
to remove the license in 2), why don't you just add the exception to your 
license text? Otherwise the last proposal would be fine.

 Thorsten