On Sunday 22 May 2005 6:55 pm, punx120 wrote: > Well, all this discussion about license are too complicated for me since > I'm not used with license. OK, but do make time to learn about licences if you're planning any more programming - it's an integral part of the process. > Concerning the license, I have just a few couple of questions. > Is there really a legal problem, according to fmod license, to > distribute my program under the gpl license ? As Shachar pointed out, it depends and it's not necessarily a legal problem. I did get that bit wrong. I snipped a bit too far and missed out this bit: "If the program is already written using the non-free library, perhaps it is too late to change the decision. You may as well release the program as it stands, rather than not release it. But please mention in the README that the need for the non-free library is a drawback, and suggest the task of changing the program so that it does the same job without the non-free library. Please suggest that anyone who thinks of doing substantial further work on the program first free it from dependence on the non-free library. Note that there may also be legal issues with combining certain non-free libraries with GPL-covered Free Software. Please see the question on GPL software with GPL-incompatible libraries for more information." http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#FSWithNFLibs The section on incompatible libraries comments: " you need to add your own exception, wholly outside of the GPL." In effect, you're amending the GPL to cover one specific exception. It's not ideal and it means you would need to make this clear on the website and in the README, as above. There are licences that don't require amendment or warnings to cover your situation but only you can decide which licence is worth using. Start at the www.gnu.org site and take a look at some of the free and non-free licences - those that are and are not GPL compatible. > If yes, what license would be best ? There are so many, I wouldn't know where to start. > Do you think there is a problem, if a made a fmod package, and i only > put it on my website ? It would be only fair to make it clear to those who would download it that it is "non-free" and if you do use the exception, make that clear too as it does have implications for those who would modify or distribute your code. > In the same way, if I wrote a program using java (Sun), could i > distribute it under the GPL license ? That would be the LGPL, if I read the gnu site correctly, but I don't use Java at all, so I haven't really looked at that. -- Neil Williams ============= http://www.data-freedom.org/ http://www.nosoftwarepatents.com/ http://www.linux.codehelp.co.uk/
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