On Tue, 2003-07-15 at 20:28, Tom Duerbusch wrote: > John Summerfield wrote: > > > > >Please, take care with your language. "public domain" means that I can > >take it, change it, copyright it, not reveal my changes etc. > > > Yes, you are right. I keep getting the variety of terms mixed up. Public > Domain isn't the same as "GNU" (is it?). And it seems like there is a > third type (or perhaps just another term that is the same as a previous > term).
GNU is not a license. Nor is it Unix. It is an acronym, standing for "GNU's Not Unix." GPL, on the other hand, *is* a license. It is the "GNU Public License," which, among other things, says that if you take a GPLed program, and modify it or incorporate it in something else, and distribute the modified version of it, you must make the source code available for your modifications. It is this that makes it "viral" and unbeloved of many people. There's also the BSD License, which allows you to take a project and modify and commercialize it, as long as you maintain attribution and publically recognize the foundation of your code, the Artistic License, which is also mostly about maintaining attribution, and a whole bunch of other Open Source licenses. See http://www.opensource.org/licenses/ for a great deal more info. Adam
