On Thu, 2005-13-01 at 15:28 -0500, Brian Thomas Sniffen wrote: > "Michael K. Edwards" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > > On Thu, 13 Jan 2005 12:21:51 -0500, Brian Thomas Sniffen > > <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > [snip] > >> So in answer to your direct question: the unlinked binary isn't > >> derived from any of them. The complete binary, including its > >> libraries, included whichever one Debian shipped it with. > > > > No, it's not a derivative work in a copyright sense at any stage. > > I didn't say it was. I said that the complete program includes the > libraries. That is, the program called vim distributed by Debian > includes libc, because when I say "apt-get install vim" I get libc6 > installed onto my system, and when I then instruct my computer to run > vim, it loads libc and some vim-specific code into memory. > > > That's a phrase with a legal meaning, and combining by any means that > > isn't itself a creative act doesn't create one. > > I understand that quite well, thank you. You are ignoring the > creative act performed by the programmer who arranged calls to > functions within libc. That was creative effort on his part which > critically involves a copy of libc. > > Put differently: my claim is not that vim is derivative of libc. My > claim is that Vim includes a copy of libc! It may also be a > derivative -- I don't think the vim-specific parts are, but the > vim-specific parts plus the libc copy might be.
I think Debian 'control' files that state Build-depends: and Depends: show quite explicitely what pieces of software Debian distributes "bound together", which is actually rather nice. Of course (just to make sure nobody misunderstands) having a GPL-incompatible program depend on a GPL program is not yet a problem. But if such a program is linked against GPLed libraries, whose are additionally constrained by explicit 'depends' on a specific library, it pretty much says: a) when you apt-get source, we'll compile this GPL-incompatible program against this GPLed library b) when you apt-get install, we'll run this GPL-incompatible program with a GPLed library. Putting it differently: if that was allowed, then why do we need glibc to be LGPLed, and not GPLed? After all the C language and its basic libraries are also standarized to great extent. But having glibc purely GPL just doesn't sound good, does it? Grzegorz B. Prokopski -- Grzegorz B. Prokopski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> SableVM - Free, LGPL'ed Java VM http://sablevm.org Why SableVM ?!? http://sablevm.org/wiki/Features Debian GNU/Linux - the Free OS http://www.debian.org -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]