[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread] 

List:       kde-licensing
Subject:    Re: QT Designer _NOT_ under QPL.
From:       Steve Hutton <shutton () mediaone ! net>
Date:       2000-08-16 13:31:03
[Download RAW message or body]

On Wed, 16 Aug 2000, Joseph Carter wrote:
> On Tue, Aug 15, 2000 at 07:37:54PM -0400, Steve Hutton wrote:
> > > http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/license-list.html
> > > 
> > >     Since the QPL is incompatible with the GNU GPL, you cannot take a
> > >     GPL-covered program and Qt and link them together, no matter how.
> > 
> > Simply repeating this over and over won't make it true.  It's
> > _one_opinion_, and the law give no extra weight to the author
> > of a license when it comes time to interpret the license.  There's
> > no room for "what I really meant when I wrote that was..."
> 
> This is the FSF's opinion.  It's also Debian's opinion.  And it's Red
> Hat's opinion as well.  (though they'll give you an excuse about "market
> forces" making them ignore these issues until they are resolved one way or
> the other..  which of course will never happen...)
> 
> 
> It's funny to read someone argue that there is no room for "what I really
> meant was..." given that is precisely what you expect Debian to accept in
> the case of GPL and QPL compatibility.  We don't think they are.  And if
> it's not enough to say "but we meant..." then it's not.  And regardless of
> the legal standings of whether or not that will hold, Debian always has
> and still does require each item of the DFSG to be explicitly met for
> inclusion into main.  We also apply the same standard of explicit
> compatibility in cases where licenses are mixed.  If the licenses aren't
> compatible at face value, they do not meet our requirements.

This is fine, it is just misleading to say it is legally motivated.  I could
make a distribution tomorrow with a policy of not shipping any apps
that don't say "I like pudding" in front of their licenses.  I wouldn't,
however, demand that authors add that phrase so I can actually
ship something.  Make your bed, but lie in it.  

> KDE will never be in Debian.  I don't have to see to that.  KDE's biggest
> proponents will do it and blame us for it.  Why the hell do you think I
> refuse to do anything more for KDE?  I'm tired of being blamed by KDE and
> Debian alike for not resolving the problem.  And being in the Debian camp,
> I happen to agree with Debian.  We are under NO OBLIGATION to package KDE.
> And KDE developers and supporters want to make it as hard as possible for
> us to do so, demanding that we change our policies for them.

Who is doing the demanding?  KDE seems to not care what Debian does,
remember?  
 
> > "You may re-use this code as long as you make all my original
> > sources availble when you do so, and you must make the sources
> > to your additions available, AND, you must insure that anyone who
> > further derives from your derviation will not suffer through the horrible
> > inconvenience of having to distribute any portion of that work
> > through a PATCH(!)"
> > 
> > Is that what Free software is about these days?
> 
> It's what the GPL is about.  Read it sometime.  The GPL demands that you
> never have to jump through any other hoops than the ones it outlines.
> Sometimes that's a real PITA (Richard and I have "discussed" (for some
> versions of "discuss", I think the discussions usually ended with him
> being rather annoyed..) why this is sometimes not a good thing) but at
> least as often as it's been annoying it's been helpful.

Oh, so the GPL is about not "jumping through hoops?"  All this time I thought
it was about Freedom, silly me.  RMS must be quite the marketeer...

Steve

[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]