Re: can one build commercial applications with latest gnat and other licenses related questions...

[M E Leypold <development-2006-8ecbb5cc8aREMOVETHIS@ANDTHATm-e-leypold.de>]

Georg Bauhaus <bauhaus@futureapps.de> writes:

> > If, of course you think, that "free" in any sense only pairs well with
> > "free" -- like your above arguments seems to indicate -- I'd suggest
> > that futureapps.de (Your Employer / company?) would stop using free
> > Linux and free Apache to server their business web pages thus unfairly
> > and unfreely commercially profiting (boo, boo) from the free software.
> 
> In fact, we did and do contribute to free software, incl. some money.
> Both because it's fair, and because it helps our business. It also
> tends to follow open standards. Obviously, we haven't contributed
> in a big way. We also use GPL software where we can. We can't always,
> you describe the situation as known to you. 

> But we don't complain that makers of Free Software disallow use of
> their GPL tools and components for closed source software. If you
> need that, pay them, if you can.


I didn't do that, and I'd rather you took that back. If (which I find
doubtful) tried to follow my arguments you'll find that 

 (a) I never doubted AdaCores right to put Gnat GPL under GPL. 

 (b) Considered it harmful to the community (that is the widespread
     use of Ada as alangauge in areas presently occupied by
     C/C++/Java) that there are perhaps (which is still usbject to
     research) no modern and commerically viable Bindings to graphical
     toolkit.

 (c) Answered to you morally founded argument that users of free tools
     should produce free software that 

The answer that I'm only "complain that makers of Free Software
disallow use of their GPL tools (..)" goes a bit far. Apart from the
fact that Gnat is based on GCC which doesn't have that usage
restriction, I seriously doubt that anybody here has been aware of the
GtkAda licensing change before. (which is the primary point in (b)).

I'm not complaining: I did try to clarify a situation and was met (by
you) with probably irrelevant and rather philosphical arguments about
what should and what should not.

I actively resent being then drawn into a discussion about the
morality of profiting from free software and getting replies that
start with "your business should" all the time. I didn't ask your
advice on that.

I've had a rather longish point to point answer to your last one, but
after I found myself reiteratiing the same points again and again,
decided that it is useless. Since I can't see your point in all of
that, this discussion is ended from my side.

Regards -- Markus