From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,faf964ea4531e6af X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: 1025b4,43ae7f61992b3213 X-Google-Attributes: gid1025b4,public From: "Joshua E. Rodd" Subject: Re: GPL and "free" software Date: 1999/04/27 Message-ID: <37264DE6.7AA43E60@noah.dhs.org>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 471672899 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit References: <7fibd5$jc7$1@news2.tor.accglobal.net> <7g2epv$k11$1@netnews.upenn.edu> <7g2l0f$58g$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com> <7g4jme$5sq$3@netnews.upenn.edu> <1rlV2.97$jw4.11389@burlma1-snr2> <7g5cb2$bjn$1@netnews.upenn.edu> X-Accept-Language: en Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Complaints-To: abuse@neo.rr.com X-Trace: dustdevil.neo.rr.com 925257190 24.93.213.213 (Tue, 27 Apr 1999 19:53:10 EDT) Organization: Road Runner High Speed Online -- Northeast Ohio MIME-Version: 1.0 NNTP-Posting-Date: Tue, 27 Apr 1999 19:53:10 EDT Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,gnu.misc.discuss Date: 1999-04-27T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: Paul Hughett wrote: > Also note that B does not have the right to distribute the software--even > his own modifications--under any license other than the GPL. That's > why they call the GPL a virus. B could distribute patches, though, for their modifications and distribute them under any licence they please. (A standard diff patch wouldn't be acceptable as it includes lines of context which would make the patch a derived work; an ed diff would be acceptable, however.) D (i.e. any one) could get the patches from B, possibly under another licence, and apply them to the GPL'd code. D (or B) could not redistribute the patched sources or binaries, however, if the patch were incompatible with the {L|}GPL. Two instances which come to mind of people actually doing this are some patches to Motif (that's all I remember) and the Minix-vmd patches (before Minix was redistributable at all). Cheers, Joshua.