mage wrote:
All it is really saying is that if you have a patent that covers some
aspect GPL'ed software, and you distribute that software, then you are
granting a nonexclusive, royalty-free license for that patent as used by
that software, or any derivatives that keep to the GPL. Also, it tries
to keep everyone playing nice, by saying that if you distribute GPL
software, then either receive a a patent for things that software does,
or purchase such a patent, then you are pre-agreeing to license that
patent. So if Example Big Company (EBC) distributes GPL software, then
applies for a patent that includes what that software does, then they
can't go back and sue people for using the very software they distributed.
Thanks,
Chris
Different example:
EBC borrows code from an GPL application and puts it into their
own application. They patent an algorithm and install it into
their application. They are now required to provide a
nonexclusive, royalty-free license for that patent for that
application if they provide binaries.
I assume this is the intent.
--
Allen Brown [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.peak.org/~abrown/
Two plus two does not equal five, even for very large values of two.
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