From: bir7@leland.Stanford.EDU (Ross Biro) Subject: Re: What would people think of binary-only software on Linux? Date: Mon, 1 Mar 1993 07:42:51 GMT
In article <1ms9mrINN4c6@shelley.u.washington.edu> tzs@carson.u.washington.edu (Tim Smith) writes:
>bir7@leland.Stanford.EDU (Ross Biro) writes:
>>For those in gnu.misc.discuss: The question is weather or not it is ok
>>to distribute proprietary .o files to be linked into the Linux kernel
>>(a GPL covered work.) I am arguing that it is not.
>
>Your mistake is an implicit assumption that you can put me under a
>license by using my software.
>
>Assume I do the following:
>
> 1. Write a device driver in C for Linux. I use my own header
> files rather than any Linux header files.
>
> 2. Compile this with Metaware C under DOS.
>
> 3. Run a program of my own that converts object files from
> Metaware's format to Linux's format.
>
>I'm not using any GPL'ed software, and so have not had to agree to GPL
>for anything I've done.
>
>Assume you do the following:
>
> 1. Obtain Linux.
>
> 2. Use it.
>
>You have agreed to GPL and you are bound by it.
>
>Now, I post the binary of my object file to the net. You grab it, and link
>it into Linux.
>
>*You* are still bound by GPL. *You* cannot distribute your resulting version
>of Linux. If you do, and someone asks for source, and you can't give it
>to them, it's you who will get sued[1], not me. The worst that will happen
>to me, legally, is I might be called as a witness.
>
>If the owners of the Linux copyrights wanted to prevent the above
>scenerio, they would have to do something like claim a copyright
>on the driver interface itself.
I maintain that the act of linking the proprietary .o file into
the GPL'ed kernel would be a violation of the GPL. Otherwise I could get
around the GPL by simply distributing my derived work in three parts.
1) gpl.o all the gpl'ed parts ( I would include source for this.)
2) proprietary.o (the proprietary part which you are not
aloud to re-distribute.)
3) an install script to link them together.
This is clearly a violation of the GPL as RMS has mentioned.
Furthermore since I would be providing materials whose sole use and
purpose is to help people to violate a contract, if the copyright
holders on the GPL'ed software didn't sue me, my customers would.
I think one of the best arguments that this is the case is that Next,
Lucid and all the other companies which have modified GPL'ed software
have not tried it. Furthermore this is exactly the case that RMS
talked about in the message that was posted earlier.
Basically the benefits to be gained by attempting to get around the
GPL in such a fasion are not worth the risk.
Ross Biro bir7@leland.stanford.edu
Member League for Programming Freedom (LPF)
mail lpf@uunet.uu.net to protect your Freedom