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What does the GPL allow? (Announce)

posted by mbbrutman Homepage, Washington, USA, 30.05.2011, 16:30
(edited by mbbrutman on 30.05.2011, 16:45)

> Shouldn't that be obvious? Or should the question rather be "Shouldn't you
> know what your license does and does not allow?"?
I spent quite a bit of time comparing GPL2 and GPL3. I think I know the boundaries of the licenses quite well. (Not liking my license choice does not give you the right to infer that I don't understand the license.)


> Linking the code with the application makes the GPL apply to all code
> linked together therein.
Good - that was intentional.


> It doesn't matter whether the libraries are dynamically linked (separate
> files at run-time), whether they are statically linked during linkage
> (separate static library/object files passed to linker), or whether they
> are already "linked" by being compiled at the same time (separate source
> code files but compiled to basically the same group of object files and
> treated like the application's source code).
>
> The only exceptions for this are:
> (a) GPL source code is allowed to be linked to non-GPL "system libraries"
> or some such, the exact definition can be found in the GPL's text, and
> (b) source code that isn't actually licensed under the GPL, but under a
> modified GPL with additional linking exception. This modified GPL used to
> be called LGPL but I don't think it's formally called that with GPLv3.

Understood.

> If none of those exceptions apply then all of the application's source code
> must be provided under the GPL's terms. As you may have heard the GPL is
> incompatible with a number of other software licenses.
>
> > The library is not a standalone component that gets built first,
> > so there is no obstacle to using it.
>
> Wrong.

Ok, so the obstacle is that if you use my code you have to ship it under GPL3. I don't see that as an obstacle.

If you use mTCP I want you to use GPL3. I don't want people modifying the work and distributing it without making the modifications public and under the same license that I chose. I don't see that as a bad thing.

If you or anybody else finds a case where my choice of license is blocking creativity or the release of code good code, contact me at my email address and talk to me about it. As the original developer I have the right to release that code under GPL2 as well. I'm willing to work with people to get the right license in place.

I choose GPL3 because I believe it is a better license. It never occurred to me that after dropping 30,000 lines of code in a place where it was desperately needed that I'd have people complaining about the license instead of discussing the code. We call that "looking the gift horse in the mouth".



Mike

---
mTCP - TCP/IP apps for vintage DOS machines!
http://www.brutman.com/mTCP

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