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List:       kmail-devel
Subject:    Re: PATCH: Asynchronous filtering
From:       "Aaron J. Seigo" <aseigo () kde ! org>
Date:       2003-10-28 19:12:17
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On Tuesday 28 October 2003 02:37, Marc Mutz wrote:
> And to make the round complete: We use OpenSSL, which is
> GPL-incompatible. In a way, that makes us (as in KDE) violate the GPL,
> with the result that if anyone starts enforcing the GPL terms on us, we
> may lose the right to use the GPL

FYI, this isn't how licensing works.

you don't lose the rights to use a type of license simply because your license 
isn't kosher; nor do you lose the rights to other licensed products simply 
because you violate some other software's license terms  which is licensed 
under the same or similar licenses.

furthermore, you can't lose rights to your own software simply because your 
user license is bogus. your users may find that they have software they can't 
use, but that doesn't affect you. the GPL even states as much itself: "Thus, 
it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights 
to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right 
to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the 
Program."

the GPL is about distribution and duplication. it isn't about your ownership 
of your own product(s). should someone contest KSSL's license's legality, 
then we would have an opportunity to fix it. you don't just get your rights 
yanked, esp if you can show you reasonably believed your were in compliance; 
there are grace periods and reasonable allowances for compliance to be 
attained. and again, this would "only" affect our users access to the 
software, not the KSSL authors.

there's also the issue of implied allowance, whereby when you place something 
of your own dong under a license you can imply an exception to yourself in 
doing so. this is questionable, and not everyone buys into it. (hello, 
Debian). oh, and i'm not a lawyer, so, grain of salt, yadda yadda. but please 
refrain, if you would, from spreading such blatant and horrid misinformation 
as "we could lose the right to use the GPL".

as for the technical/practical reasons for not using something else, gnutls is 
still very young and only recently matured. i'm not sure how much it has been 
audited, but i do know that OpenSSL has been and continues to be. there are 
also several thousands lines of code in KSSL that would need to be refitted 
to something !OpenSSL. i'm sure you see all that as mere details, however. ;)
 
- -- 
Aaron J. Seigo
GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA  EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43
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