Fedora Desktop future- RedHat moves

Alan Cox alan at lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk
Mon Apr 28 12:55:35 UTC 2008


> > But you see that library is the GPL authors code and they've exercised
> > their right as an author to decide what they do with their code.
> 
> No, they've gone well beyond that in claiming that your own code which 
> calls that library's interfaces is also under their control.

I think you are still reading "linking" as code. Also remember that the
GPLv2 actually pretty much predates "normal" use of dynamic linking.

> > Anyway you can always write an alternative library.
> 
> How can the existence of a different library make any difference to the 
> status of another piece of code that might use it? 

Bingo..

That is the heart of the question - are you just using some generic
interface (and US caselaw is mostly against API copyright) or are you
creating a new work which incorporates an existing work.

Just as with books - am I creating a book referencing another work or a
book that incorporates chunks of another book, and that depends on
context and isn't entirely clear - see the current Harry Potter lawsuit.

Alan




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