Re: MinGW Ada compiler licence question targeting commercial applications

[Ludovic Brenta <ludovic@ludovic-brenta.org>]

John B. Matthews wrote on comp.lang.ada:
> I was puzzled by this, too:
>
> <http://lists.adacore.com/pipermail/gtkada/2009-June/thread.html>

You're not the only one; I've tried to explain things in the README
file of most Debian packages. Here is the text I wrote for libgtkada2-
dev at the time of the license change in 2005:

Licensing changes
-----------------

In the previous version of Debian, libgtkada2 2.4.0 was licensed under
the terms of the GNAT-Modified GNU General Public License (GMGPL).
This new version is licensed under the terms of the pure GPL.  As a
consequence, it is no longer legal to distribute proprietary software
that incorporates this library.  If your program uses GtkAda, and if
you wish your program to use licensing terms incompatible with the
GPL, you have three choices:

- distribute your program in source form only, and require your
  licensees to build it for themselves.  Your sources need not be
  under GPL, since they are not linked to GtkAda.

- contact AdaCore, the upstream author, at sales@adacore.com, and
  purchase a GMGPL license for GtkAda.

- do not distribute your program at all.

You may be tempted to retrieve the sources from AdaCore's CVS
repository.  Be warned that doing so will still grant you a pure GPL
license, despite the fact that AdaCore have not yet adjusted the
licensing boilerplate in source files.  In Debian, I have removed the
"special exception" language only to remove confusion.  It is not I
who changed the actual license, it is AdaCore.  Contact them at
libre@adacore.com for any clarification.

--
Ludovic Brenta.