🚀 go-pugleaf

barmar@think.com (Barry Margolin) writes:
> In article <FZ4ueB49w164w@mantis.co.uk> mathew@mantis.co.uk (Lieutenant 030) 
> >That's not true either.  If I write a program which includes some GNU
> >software and distribute it with source for only the GNU bits, then I'm not
> >distributing GNU software in ways the FSF dislikes.  Yet I'm not allowed
> >to do that.
> 
> What's the point of distributing something in that manner.

The user gets the GNU code under the GPL, exactly as the FSF wants GNU code
to be distributed.  If you want, I'll even distribute the *entire* GNU program
I took bits of code from.  So if I rip some regular expression matching
routines from gawk, I distribute a free copy of gawk along with my commercial
software.

The end result is that I get to distribute code which only I have 
written in a way which only I have decided. The FSF gets me to 
distribute code which only it has written in a way which only it has 
decided.

The user gets a useful, working program.  He also gets a useful, working
distribution of a GNU program.

>                                                    The main reason
> for distributing source is to allow the recipient to modify and/or
> recompile it.

I might distribute source for my bits.  I just wouldn't distribute them
under the GPL.

>                       If you leave out your bits, then the GNU bits are
> essentially useless with respect to use and enhancement of your program.

OK, so let's say I distribute source for my program, but it's not under
the GPL.

The user has the entire source code for the program.  He also has a full
release of whatever GNU software I took code from.  He can pass on the
GNU software, and he can pass on the GNU bits of the program.  He just
can't pass on my bits of the program.

What's unreasonable about that?  I'm not trying to hoard GNU code or make
it unsharable.  I'm not preventing the user from recompiling.  I'm not
preventing the user from passing on GNU code.


mathew

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"Tolkien's writing appeals also to those with the mental age of a child --
 computer programmers, hippies and most Americans"
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