hi, thanks for the quick reply.
On 09/29/2015 06:58 PM, Jeff Epler wrote: > On Tue, Sep 29, 2015 at 05:14:11PM +0200, IOhannes m zmölnig (Debian/GNU) > wrote: >> i'm currently thinking about packaging "linuxsampler", which has a >> somewhat abominable license, which they call "GPL with commercial >> exception" [1]. >> >> [1] https://www.linuxsampler.org/downloads.html#exception > > For discussion, the text in question from the linuxsampler website reads: > > [*] LinuxSampler is licensed under the GNU GPL with the exception that > USAGE of the source code, libraries and applications FOR COMMERCIAL > HARDWARE OR SOFTWARE PRODUCTS IS NOT ALLOWED without prior written > permission by the LinuxSampler authors. If you have questions on the > subject, that are not yet covered by the FAQ, please contact us. > > I think this is more a *prohibition* (something permitted by the GPL, > use for any purposes, is prohibited) than an *exception*. > > The page also says that a mandatory dependency of LinuxSampler, libgig, > is licensed under GPL without prohibition. > > In my opinion: > - GPL with additional use prohibition is not DFSG-compatible > - GPL with additional use prohibition is not GPL-compatible > > As a consequence of the second item, I believe LinuxSampler is not > distributable at all, since it works only by linking GPL-compatible and > GPL-incompatible code together into a single work, so I don't believe > that LinuxSampler can be distributed even in the non-free archive. hmm, the upstream authors doubt that, arguing that they as the authors of libgig are allowed to do so. https://www.linuxsampler.org/faq.html#ls_breaking_libgig_license but i guess there argument only holds, as long as *they* distribute the combined binaries (and not a 3rd party like Debian). anyhow, if the use of libgig is the only problem, then i think it can be solved rather easily (e.g. the upstream authors adding an explicit exception to the license of libgig, that allows its use in linuxsampler) (btw, i also think that your wording is a bit unfortunate: there is nothing in the world that a priori prohibits linking *GPL-compatible* and *GPL-incompatible* code; LGPL and BSD-3-clause are all *compatible* and allow linking with proprietary code) gmrdsa IOhannes PS: thanks for keeping me (and pkg-multimedia) in the loop, as I'm not subscibed to debian-legal.
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