Kyle McDonald <KMcDonald at egenera.com> wrote:
> I thought that shared libraries resolved this, since the 'linking' was
> done at run time by the end user, and not the distributor. The
> distributor is, as I understand it the one that is prevented from
> linking (and then distributing) GPL and non-GPL code. So static linking
> is out, but dynamic linking should be ok, no?
>
> Is that a too simplistic reading of the license?
Yes, it is a too simplistic reading of the license:
In order to understand the intention of the GPL, you first need to know when
dynamic linking has been introduced and when the GPLv2 has been written.
Dynamic linking on SunOS has been introduced around 1988 - at that time,
SunOS based machines have been the major development platform for the FSF/GNU
people.
The GPLv2 has been written around 1992 - this is definitely some time after
dynamic linking has been introduced. The GPLv2 text thus has been written in
full knowledge of dynamic linking.
For a legal case, only the original GPLv2 license text would be of interest and
this text does (intentionally) not discriminate between dynamic and static
linking. It uses different ("work" based) terms to describe what't allowed and
what not.
GPLv2 ?2 b) says:
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
parties under the terms of this License.
and thus "using"/"calling" an interface from a GPLd "work" could be interpreted
as creating a "derived work".
As a note for completness: the reverse direction: "GPLd work calls non-GPL
code"
is not affected by the GPLv2. This has been done to intentionally allow to
distribute binaries from GPLd code for closed source platforms such as HP-UX or
AIX.
J?rg
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EMail:joerg at schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) J?rg Schilling D-13353 Berlin
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