[haiku-development] Re: INPUT / VOTE : --include-gpl-addons
- From: Urias McCullough <umccullough@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: haiku-development@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 19 Aug 2009 16:23:04 -0700
Sorry to drag this on and on... :)
I realize that over the years I may have come to some incorrect
conclusions about the GPL, but I always find these discussion riddled
with fear and loathing of the GPL more than anything... so I want to
make sure we're not excluding GPL parts for the wrong reasons.
On Wed, Aug 19, 2009 at 3:34 PM, Niels Reedijk<niels.reedijk@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Section 2b of the license goes as follows:
>
> """b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
> whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part
> thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties
> under the terms of this License."""
>
> The 'viral' aspect of the GPL is in this statement. It circumvents the
> discussion you are having by claiming that any program that uses GPL'd
> code, must be completely GPL.
Well, let's stop right here and analyze what you're reading. You don't
have to actually change the license in your code to GPL. Per what you
quoted, when distributing/publishing the work (as in, binary form),
the entire derived work must be licensed under the terms of the GPL.
This only means you must apply the terms of the license. It does not
necessarily imply that you have to change the license on your source
code as well.
At least, this has always been my understanding. Most FAQ I read about
this conveniently leaves the nitty-gritty details of going from a less
restrictive license to a more restrictive license. It seems in almost
every case, the FAQ revolves around the assumption that someone wants
to use GPL code and somehow keep their sources closed as well. This
notion that someone might want to release their code under a "free-er"
license than GPL is rarely ever considered ;)
I'd love to hear the interpretation from someone who is very much in
the know, but who is not also a GPL zealot...
> Now the theoretical issue is whether add-ons are like modules
> (read:libraries) or whether they are independent apps that communicate
> with another independent app. (read on)
Yes, that's always where things get fuzzy when trying to determine
whether the GPL conditions even apply or not...
<snip>
>> The MIT license is said to be GPL-compatible. AFAICT that mainly means that
>> it is OK with 2. b) of the GPL v2, i.e. it allows a work combined from MIT
>> licensed and GPLed work to be distributed under the GPL. What that means in
>> the case of our media codecs -- no idea.
>
> The MIT license is compatible because it is less restrictive than the
> GPL, effectively meaning that if you distribute MIT code with GPL
> code, you can relicense the MIT portion to GPL to confirm to the
> requirements.
>
> This effectively means that you are doubly licensing the source files
> at that point.
But you aren't really doubly-licensing the source files, right? You
are really just conforming to the GPL license terms by providing those
sources to the recipient of the distributed product per the GPL
agreement in the code you have used. AFAIK, that recipient of the
sources can then independently remove the GPL parts from those sources
and re-release the binary as non-GPL code. This is possible as long as
the GPL-derived parts are removed again. As you suggest, anyone can
"doubly-license" MIT code as GPL if they want, that is why it is
considered "GPL-friendly". This is exactly what we have done with
ffmpeg for example - removed the GPL portions and re-released the
rest.
I guess this is possibly an interpretation thing.
<snip>
> That's the issue at hand, and there is no legal answer to it yet.
> There was a decision (a while back) to separate GPL add-ons from the
> distribution, in order to not get into trouble if this was ever
> decided in court.
But, what is this trouble? If we conform to the license, by already
distributing the sources per the GPL requirements, where are we at
fault in the first place?
> So I think the best way is to ask the authors of the GPL modules if
> they can grant us a formal exemption by allowing us to use their
> module as an add-on.
Agreed, but mostly to find out if they even have an issue in the first
place. I suspect they won't, but who knows.
- Urias
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