Hartmut,
AFAIK, there's no precedence to preventing source distribution because of
software license compatibility or incompatibility with other libraries. Be
they GPL'd, MS EULA'd or anything else. I have strong doubts that if it
ever arrives at a court, such a thing would be accepted. My bet is that it
won't be, because it's fairly dumb (a product cannot restrict a 2nd
product; It can prevent the 2nd product from interfacing with it, but only
when it actually tries to interface, not as long as there are lines of text
in a source file). I could be wrong, and right now, it doesn't really matter.
It may be ok for you that when you put 'GPL' on a piece of code, it's not
really clear what that means and essentially it assigns a degree of power
to Stallman, which can later decide what the GPL does or does not
mean. Personally, I'm less receptive of this idea (although this
definitely is not the main problem I have with the GPL). I'm not very
quick on letting other people to decide what I can or cannot do; If it's
in the source code that I write, or the license terms that I choose.
Zeev
At 02:17 16/1/2001, Hartmut Holzgraefe wrote:
>Zeev Suraski wrote:
> >
> > Not really - the FSF has very strong power outside the court - the power of
> > the public opinion. When someone is portrayed in 'Good vs. Evil' (GNU vs.
> > put_your_name_here), then things beyond legal basis come into the
> > picture.
>
>with Steve Jobs being the guy that he is i can't believe this
>was going on with NexT/Objective C right now ...
>
> > It doesn't change the fact that the GPL is a very vague legal document
>from all the license contracts i have seen this was one of the rather
>clear ones after all (and my lawyer thought so too)
>although it all comes down to how you define 'derivated work'
>after all ...
>
> > which is essentially why people always say the GPL is
> > 'what Richard Stallman says it is'.
>as with almost every law or general purpose legal document you have
>interpretations and/or descriptions of intent besides the pure
>'legal speak'
>and with RMS being the original author or at least originator and
>the one who payed some lawyers to make it do what he requiered it
>to do it's quite ok for me to have him be the final interpretative
>instance at least as far as code (c)RMS or (c)FSF is concerned
>(as for example readline is)
>
>if your definition of compatible vs. derivated work was right
>it would render the whole distinction between the GPL and the LGPL
>useless after all ...
>
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Zeev Suraski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
CTO & co-founder, Zend Technologies Ltd. http://www.zend.com/
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