Do I have to release the patch under GPL if the patch is for a GPL software?
Ask yourself the following, is the patch a deriviate work? If it is, then it must be licensed under the terms of the GNU GPL. As my understanding, for example, If I modified Linux kernel, I do not have to release it under GPL if I use it privately, unless I make it public. You are confusing releasing and licensing. But how about the patch for the kernel? That is, if I generate the patch of my modification for the Linux Kernel, and never release the modified Linux kernel to public, however, I want to sell the kernel patch of the Linux to customers as whatever license as I want, but I don't want the patch under GPL for some reason. Can I? You can charge a fee for distributing the patch (or for any free software infact) or even a tarball of the whole Linux tree with the patch included. What you must do though is give the people you distribute the patch to (for a fee or not) the same rights as you recived; i.e. you must follow the terms of the GNU GPL since the patch is derived from a work which is licensed under the GNU GPL. So in short, no. I suggest that you read the GNU GPL FAQ[0], it contains many answers to these types of questions. And I'd also like to recommend the essays at http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/, most notably `Why Software Should Be Free' by RMS. Cheers. [0]: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html _______________________________________________ gnu-misc-discuss mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-misc-discuss
