[Freegis-list] Lx-Viewer (DWG viewer for Linux)

[Bernhard Reiter]

On Mon, Nov 25, 2002 at 08:20:40PM +0000, Guy Edwards wrote:
> On Mon, 2002-11-25 at 19:13, Bernhard Reiter wrote:
> [snip] 
> > 	If you want your program to link against a library not covered by
> > 	that exception, you need to add your own exception, wholly outside
> > 	of the GPL.

> I'm unsure of what form this exception should take. Can you give an
> example of a program with such an exception? I'm not disputing it I just
> want to see how someone else has done it.

http://www.lyx.org/about/license.php3
http://freecard.sourceforge.net/website/licence/license.php
Trolltech recommends it:
http://www.trolltech.com/developer/licensing/noncomm-notes.html

> Wouldn't the source still be GPL, the code only becoming tainted once
> you compiled it? Remember we aren't allowed to distribute the OpenDWG
> code with our source.

If you give somebody a "tainted" binary, they would not be licensed
to use it. Thus this does not make sense.
So you only can you GPL+ Exception or a different Free Software
license, like the Lesser GNU GPL or the non-protecting XFree86 license.

> > 	Adding this exception eliminates the legal issue, but does
> > 	nothing about the more serious problem of using a non-free library:
> > 	your program won't be fully usable in a free environment. 
> 
> Something to consider for the future. Finding an alternative to the
> OpenDWG libraries would mean a lot more work. 

Yes, you can read the full paragraph, it continues:
	So please consider: can you find a way to get the job done
	without using this library? Can you write a free replacement for
	that library?

	If the program is already written using the non-free library,
	perhaps it is too late to change the decision. You may as well
	release the program as it stands, rather than not release it. But
	please mention in the README that the need for the non-free library
	is a drawback, and suggest the task of changing the program so that
	it does the same job without the non-free library.

	Also please tell us (<tasks at gnu.org>) about the non-free library and
	what job it does. We could encourage people to develop a free
	library to do the same job. 


> I seem to remember
> something about KDE originally coming under heavy fire for using
> non-free libraries which was cured by the license for the libraries
> changing in the end? 

The problem was that people did not have a license to use KDE 
linked with QT. Most media report did not fully cover the correct details.

> Maybe it's worth sitting tight for now and waiting.

No, because to be precise people currently do not have a license to use 
binaries of lxviewer yet.


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