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List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: High Five Roberto
From:       Kurt Granroth <granroth () alpha ! tat ! physik ! uni-tuebingen ! de>
Date:       1999-05-21 2:17:00
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Holger Thon wrote:
> I also don't see why most people using gnome say they use it because
> it's free. KDE was under GPL since developement started; the only
> problem were the licence policies on qt from troll tech some time ago. 
> Now you can explicitly read that qt is free for non-commercial use
> including with KDE (it exactly reads: QT ... may be freely used for:
> "Running software developed by others (e.g. KDE)"
> "Development of open source/non-proprietary software"

The "license" issues are mostly philisophical and/or highly legalistic for
those that are serious about them (most people spout off opinions on this
topic without knowing anything about it, unfortunately).

REALLY quick rundown of license issues:

1) Qt 1.3x and 1.4x are not completely free.  To be *completely* free, you
   must be able to modify and redistribute the source.  You cannot with Qt.
2) Qt 2.0 IS completely free under the QPL
3) However, the QPL is considered to be incompatible with the GPL which is
   the primary license of KDE.

Now what 3) means to *you* seems to be variable.  That is the sole reason that
Debian will not ship KDE.  They are convinced that the QPL and GPL are
incompatible and thus, shipping KDE is illegal.  Right or wrong (and I think
they are wrong), they do have a rational argument for it.

> Having this in mind, i don't understand Miguels opinion. I think he
> should be glad about the chances peace or even cooperation might bring
> to both projects.

Miquel is an egomaniac.  It's in HIS best interest to say inflammatory things
as that's what gets him in the news.  Of course, it's in Gnome's best interest
to refrain from this.. but when it comes down to Miquel or Gnome, Miquel has
always gone with Miquel.
-- 
Kurt Granroth            | granroth@kde.org
KDE Developer/Evangelist | http://www.pobox.com/~kurt_granroth

        KDE -- Putting a Friendly Face on Linux

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