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

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

Michael Bode <m.g.bode@web.de> writes:

> Jeffrey Creem <jeff@thecreems.com> writes:
> 
> > This is not correct. If the runtime is GPL. Dynamically linking to it
> > really does not help under the strictest interpretations of the
> > GPL. 
> 
> If dynamic linking constitutes a 'derived work' this would mean that
> Microsoft's EULA is in fact much more 'Free' than GPL. You can easily

You're completely right in that respect. That is exactly why a number
of people advocate the following:

 - Use of GPL for tools and applications (that protects the community
   from someone borgifying (embrace and extend) these _programs_ and
   putting out incompatible "value added" versions (which would result
   in a vendor lockin).

 - Use of LGPL, GMGPL or BSD license for libraries. 

The last point is often contested, but one might notice that history
shows that environements (speak libraries) which absolutely preclude
the development of closed source software for certain purposes (think
about an NDA on methods and manufacturing processes your customer
wants you to sign), have a problem to build a non-hobbyist
community. Many of this projects/environments have changed the
license to a more liberal one. Some examples:

 - KDE (Qt)
 - Ocaml
 - Minix :-)

On the other side GPL has become a weapon of marketing in some hands:
I.E. MySQL not only put the client runtime unter GPL after, I think,
version 3) but (rumor has it) also has a most peculiar interpretation
of the GPL, namely that using MySQL specific syntax in one of your
(scripted) programs already constitutes linking.

I leave it to the reader to judge how much of this applies to the
recent license changes surrounding Gnat and the libraries (mostly the
libraries, since there is FSF-Gnat), since I'm not done with my
reasearch yet and also have other things to do.

> create a 'derived work' of Microsoft Windows(TM) by writing any
> program that uses any Windows DLL. And you don't have to stick
> Microsoft's EULA to it, you can even licence it under GPL.


Regards -- Markus