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=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Thread: 103376,3e26dfa741e64e5f X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit Path: g2news1.google.com!news2.google.com!newsread.com!newsprint.newsread.com!newsfeed.stueberl.de!ecngs!feeder.ecngs.de!proxad.net!infeed-3.proxad.net!nnrp12-1.free.fr!not-for-mail Sender: sam@willow.rfc1149.net From: Samuel Tardieu Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: GNAT GPL 2005 Edition is now available References: <432919be$0$10539$4d4eb98e@read.news.fr.uu.net> <1126868191.519850.18060@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com> Date: 16 Sep 2005 14:20:13 +0200 Message-ID: <873bo5jjb6.fsf@willow.rfc1149.net> User-Agent: Gnus/5.09 (Gnus v5.9.0) Emacs/21.4 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Leafnode-NNTP-Posting-Host: 2001:660:330f:f810:211:2fff:fea6:3aa1 Organization: Guest of ProXad - France NNTP-Posting-Date: 16 Sep 2005 14:25:01 MEST NNTP-Posting-Host: 81.56.47.149 X-Trace: 1126873501 nnrp12-1.free.fr 1442 81.56.47.149:62887 X-Complaints-To: abuse@proxad.net Xref: g2news1.google.com comp.lang.ada:4788 Date: 2005-09-16T14:25:01+02:00 List-Id: >>>>> "Ludovic" == Ludovic Brenta writes: Ludovic> I agree. As I have stated before, I personally do not have Ludovic> any objection to libgnat being GPL for non-customers. There Ludovic> seems to be quite strong feelings the opposite way, and even Ludovic> some frustration. These feelings and frustration do not have Ludovic> to be. Do you think that the DoD (the funder of the early GNAT versions) intent was to restrict the use of GNAT to programs using the GPL license and to AdaCore (which didn't exist) customers? The real problem is not technical. It is still possible to build a "clean" compiler which can be used on any kind of sources. The problem is political. AdaCore's move causes a lot of confusion in the community and may make companies unsure of what they can and can't do. I think it would have been much better if AdaCore had kept the GMGPL version, or if they had not complicated everything by providing GPL-only packages. The situation was simple (be an AdaCore customer or get your compiler from another source such as a GNU/Linux distribution or build it from FSF sources), it is now ugly (in some cases, you can get a GNAT compiler which doesn't allow you to use a GPL-incompatible license for your source code if you intend to redistribute the result). I still fail to understand this tactical move. Sam -- Samuel Tardieu -- sam@rfc1149.net -- http://www.rfc1149.net/sam