Request: Summary of GPL Problems

Jay Carlson nop at nop.com
Wed Nov 14 03:25:40 UTC 2001


[not really reading much of the list these days....]

What a good summary!  I think this, in this form, is faq-worthy (short, to
the point, not particularly inflamatory).  Put it up on the wiki, and point
people to it first whenever this discussion opens.

I still haven't decided what I think of the MPL (
http://www.mozilla.org/MPL/MPL-1.1.html ) in a Squeak (or MOO) context;
section 1.9 has a big "if you're dealing with files..." clause; my gut
feeling is that the fallback position if you're not using files is similar
to squeak-l, but someone else could read the fallback as being similar to
the GPL.  Well, that's why lawyers get paid.  Certainly the lack of
specificity adds risk to the use of MPL-covered materials in projects not
based on files.

Jay

----- Original Message -----
From: "Andrew C. Greenberg" <werdna at mucow.com>
To: <squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
Sent: Tuesday, November 13, 2001 3:45 PM
Subject: Re: Request: Summary of GPL Problems


>
> On Monday, November 12, 2001, at 11:40  PM, Russell Allen wrote:
>
> > Assuming that I am not going to worry too much about making life easy
> > for people who want to make proprietary versions of my code, is there a
> > situation where GPLing my code will impede the use of that code by other
> > researchers?
>
> Squeak (or any other open source Smalltalk model) is an excellent
> example where GPL fails in an open source context.  You cannot include
> GPL code in a monolithic image combined with non-GPL code and distribute
> the same.  Accordingly, Smalltalkers not working exclusively in
> GPL-based systems face constant license-lawyering, wondering whether the
> next bit of code violates some or another license.
>
> RMS recognized early on that distributions of GPL with unrelated
> (non-derivative) non-GPL code, and their coexistence on a single system
> and ability to run on a non-GPL'd OS, was essential for workers in the
> real world.  The problem is that the exception presumes the traditional
> Unix-based OS/application dichotomy, which has no meaning in a
> monolithic image model (indeed, Squeak need not even run under an OS).






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