On Jul 26, 2005, at 11:44 AM, David Schwartz wrote:
I help maintain wput, a command-line ftp-client that looks like wget
but instead of downloading, uploads files or whole directories to
remote ftp-servers (http://wput.sourceforge.net/).
Our latest release candidate uses OpenSSL. Before we release it, we
want to make sure we are following whatever legalities OpenSSL
requires. Currently, the wput code under GPL and ships with a copy
of "GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE", Version 2, June 1991.
If anything else should be requested or included with the source to
make us square with OpenSSL, please let me know.
Thanks in advance.
You don't need permission to link OpenSSL, however, you cannot
distribute the resulting binaries. Sorry, but that's what the GPL
says. Nothing prevents a product covered by the GPL from using
OpenSSL. However, because the two products have incompatible licenses,
each has to be distributed under its own license. If you combine them
in an inseparable way, the result is not redistributable.
As an example, I would not be entitled to redistribute wput as long as
it depended on OpenSSL, because the GPL does not give me the right to
distribute code (i.e. wput) that depends on other code (i.e. OpenSSL)
with incompatible restrictions (i.e. advertising requirements).
One solution is to allow an exception: "This code is licensed under
the GPL, with the exception that you may link it with OpenSSL." Then
I'm able to redistribute it without a problem, because you've given me
permission to do so.
Josh
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