[EMAIL PROTECTED] on 2000.08.15 13:27:32
>I think this would be difficult. I'd be very surprised indeed if Atria
>(now Rational) didn't hold patents on at least some of the crucial
>aspects of MVFS.
At some point, the patents must expire. I'm not sure when these patents were
approved, though.
> cg> I don't understand where the problem is here. As long as the code
> cg> lineage is distinct, I don't see how the GPL would force you to
> cg> reveal more than the GNU make side of the implementation. All
> cg> you're doing is integrating API calls into GNU make.
>
>Any code that is distributed with a GPL'd program must be legally
>distributed under the GPL. Providing hooks specifically to proprietary
>code could be considered (by the FSF and RMS) to be creating a derived
>work, and as such not allowed.
But don't you consider Unix system calls the same as API calls? I don't see
what the difference is.
>The realities of this are murky at best. The only realistic course for
>Rational to take would be to discuss this with RMS and see what he
>says. If he says OK, they could do it. I have a vague recollection
>that this was done by Atria a long time ago, and he said "not OK".
Hmmm.
> cg> If this weren't so, then the mere act of porting GNU make to some
> cg> proprietary UNIX platform would be illegal too.
>
>Not so. First, there are many implementations of all the functions GNU
>make uses, including GLIBC itself, which is free. So, GNU make could be
>written to use a free implementation and distributed that way. Remember
>that there is no restriction in the GPL on what the end-user does with
>the code, only on how the code can be distributed.
But most (all?) distributions of GNU make don't include libc implementations.
>Second, and more importantly, there is an explicit clause in the GPL
>which excludes system libraries like libc from these requirements.
I see. So if Rational named the library libc.a, it should be OK (half-joking)?
Noel
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