On Fri, 21 Jul 2000, Brandon wrote:
>
> Huh.. .Question. Why GPL the code? Doesn't that mean that all code developers have to share their source code with the internet community?!? I personally do not want to give up some trade secrets. Newbies (like those found constantly on this list) won't program their own stuff and just rip off a whole mud?. Well am I missing something here with the Gnu Public License (guess it is time to read a copy of it again) What is wrong with the current license?!? Is this the same as: "Well everybody else is doing it with their programs". I don't think the CircleMUD community has anything wrong with sharing code here and their, but it is their decision. Anywho. Sorry if I am missing something here
The GPL does not obligate you to release anything; it simply requires
you to provide the source code for binary/object distributions that you
make (if you modified the source code).
ex:
you decide to distribute a 'circle' binary or 'comm.o' to an
outside party;
you have to either:
(a) provide/include the with the complete source that generates
those two files at the same time
(b) provide a written offer valid at least 3 years from
the time you're distributing to provide upon request
a complete copy of the source that generated those two
files
(c) have a source distribution available from the same place
[these aren't the actual license terms; this is just the
gist of them -- the terms themselves are full of legalese
to prevent people from managing to distribute just a binary
without making source available]
Basically, you always have the choice of not releasing anything,
'internal distribution' [rwx access to binaries on a common system,
but not opened to the public or intended for release] -- is also
generally believed to be out of the licence's scope.
The GPL also doesn't prevent you from releasing individual source
files.
The GPL is evil though and highly politically-motivated to not-only
to disadvantage closed-source things but to have all Open source
code licensed under it; my recommendation would be, if you're gonna
relicense it, best to use the LGPL.
The GPL would prevent you from creating and distributing binary copies
where they are linked against libraries not under the GPL, such as
libc on some systems, and some other libraries; although GPL'd
variants of many such libraries for most OSes are available now, it
can be an annoyance -- take special note, when compiling on a Win32
system you could only legally distribute .exe files that include GPL'd
components when -all- components are GPL'd, most of the time this is
not the case -- most compilers link against proprietary libraries to
generate .exe files.
-Mysid
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