> It is my understanding you can link with whatever you want for your personal usage. > However, DISTRIBUTING a binary that links with NI VISA definitely violates the GPL. > That is why I don't distribute binaries, only source code.
The user, on his own initiative, is free to link GPL-covered code with nonfree code and use that privately. However, to modify a GPL-covered program so that it is meant to link to some non-free code, and distribute that, is not a private action. It is a way of combining the program with nonfree code. That violates the GPL. I've never been clear if this is really ok, but it seems to be a common interpretation. It seems to be, for example, how nvidia gets around Linux's copyleft and the nvidia blob. nVidia's nonfree driver violates the GPL, but the Linux developers choose not to object. We can't force them to enforce their license. As for the firmware blobs, there is an argument that firmware programs are separate programs merely packaged together with Linux, and thus not violations of the GPL. However, the issue is moot since the copyright holders of Linux choose not to enforce the GPL anyway. Richard, can you comment on this? A number of Octave users create oct files to talk to non-free libraries for external hardware. An oct file is basically a C++ program that uses Octave's headers and links to Octave. It is my understanding that these oct files are also linking to non-free libraries. I am uncomfortable that people do this and distribute the results. What do you think? That could be a GPL violation. We need to look at the specific details. -- Dr Richard Stallman President, Free Software Foundation 51 Franklin St Boston MA 02110 USA www.fsf.org www.gnu.org Skype: No way! That's nonfree (freedom-denying) software. Use Ekiga or an ordinary phone call ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Monitor your physical, virtual and cloud infrastructure from a single web console. Get in-depth insight into apps, servers, databases, vmware, SAP, cloud infrastructure, etc. Download 30-day Free Trial. Pricing starts from $795 for 25 servers or applications! http://p.sf.net/sfu/zoho_dev2dev_nov _______________________________________________ Octave-dev mailing list Octave-dev@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/octave-dev