beware GNU Smalltalk if you want to contribute to squeak

Randal L. Schwartz merlyn at stonehenge.com
Wed Jan 9 23:23:23 UTC 2008


>>>>> "David" == David Zmick <dz0004455 at gmail.com> writes:

David> if you really want to be "open", you should except anything from anywhere,
David> and licenses shouldn't matter,  at least thats how i see it.

David> what are the major differences in the two licenses?

BSD-family licenses are all variants on "do whatever you want with this code,
as long as we get some credit".  You can use Squeak in a turneky commercial
application.  You can make changes and distribute binaries.  Pretty much
whatever you want.

The GPL license requires full source code disclosure of any modifications
if you also "distribute" the code.

So, for example, let's say someone wanted a Squeak-powered cell phone.
Under the current license, it's perfectly fine to embed Squeak into the
cell phone, even making some interesting clever modification to the
VM to get it to work nicely in the embedded environment, and that
nifty modification is *private* to the creator.

Under the GPL, that would not be possible.  All modifications would have to be
available, at least on a website somewhere.

This is an overview, so excuse me if it's oversimplifies.

-- 
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn at stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
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