FC4 or FC5

[Joe Klemmer]

On Fri, 2006-06-16 at 13:59 -0400, Sean wrote:

> > Hmm. The FSF seems to say:  You use any nail other than ours, we own
> > your hammer because it's a derived work.
> 
> Naw, a programmer that chooses to release her code under the GPL
> license is giving you great freedom to use her work.  All she asks
> in return is that programmers who improve _her_ code and want to
> share it with others, do so in a way that respects the freedoms
> she gave in the first place.

	Man!  I go away from the list for a few years and what do I see when I
come back?  The same "discussions" from back in the olden days when I
started with Linux (November 1991, if anyone's interested and even if
they aren't [Yes, I am blowing my own horn as it's the only horn I have
to blow]).

	Everything old is new again.  The GPL license thing has been beaten to
death.  It's really pretty simple; if you use GPL tools and/or LGPL
libraries you can release your code under whatever license you like.  If
you incorporate any actual GPL code in your code then you have to
release it as GPL code.  But the biggest thing that people tend to
forget is that if you don't release your code you don't have to GPL it
at all, even if you take the Linux kernel and change one variable name
in it.  This, OC, only applies to GPL 2 as I haven't a clue what GPL 3
will eventually end up looking like.

	Whomever does the coding is the one who decides what license to release
it under based on what they want and what they are doing with it.  Back
in the day I would usually release anything I coded into the Public
Domain.  Saves a lot of headaches.

-- 
Joe Klemmer <klemmerj at webtrek.com>