Mailing-List: contact cygwin-help AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com; run by ezmlm Sender: cygwin-owner AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com Delivered-To: mailing list cygwin AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com From: Chris Faylor Date: Wed, 23 Jun 1999 11:42:27 -0400 To: Jason Zions Cc: "'Peter Mount'" , "'Christopher Faylor'" , "Peimer, Hylton" Subject: Re: cygwin and Postgres Message-ID: <19990623114227.A8032@cygnus.com> References: <31AA903A2A1FD111A06300805F4B6D640297930F AT ssi2 DOT interix DOT com> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii X-Mailer: Mutt 0.95.3i In-Reply-To: <31AA903A2A1FD111A06300805F4B6D640297930F@ssi2.interix.com>; from Jason Zions on Tue, Jun 22, 1999 at 02:28:23PM -0700 On Tue, Jun 22, 1999 at 02:28:23PM -0700, Jason Zions wrote: >> Are you sure about this? > >Yes, he's sure about this. > >>Using GPLed software to compile a commercial product doesn't imply that >>the final product needs to be under the GPL. Infact the new versions >>of the GPL & LGPL have new clauses to try to get round this confusion. > >It's not just a matter of using GPL'd software to build the commercial >product. The cygwin runtime support code is GPL'd. Software which >uses that code at run-time must also be GPL'd. This is the principal >difference between the LGPL and the GPL. Suppose the runtime is a >shared library. If it's covered by the GPL, a user of that library is >"infected" with the GPL as well. If it's covered instead by the LGPL, >the user of the library is *not* infected. This is generally true but we have changed the license recently. The new license will be in B21. The change allows you to link libcygwin.a into your software and redistribute it as long as *your* software sources are made freely available. It does not allow you to use libcygwin.a for proprietary commercial software. For that you need to contact Cygnus for a commercial license. I've included the CYGWIN_LICENSE file from recent snapshots below. cgf -------------------------------------------------------------------------- This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL) as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- *** NOTE *** In accordance with section 10 of the GPL, Cygnus permits programs whose sources are distributed under a license that complies with the Open Source(tm) definition to be linked with libcygwin.a without libcygwin.a itself causing the resulting program to be covered by the GNU GPL. This means that you can port an Open Source(tm) application to cygwin, and distribute that executable as if it didn't include a copy of libcygwin.a linked into it. Note that this does not apply to the cygwin DLL itself. If you distribute a (possibly modified) version of the DLL you must adhere to the terms of the GPL, i.e., you must provide sources for the cygwin DLL. See http://www.opensource.org/osd.html for the precise Open Source Definition referenced above. If you have questions about any of the above or would like to arrange for other licensing terms, please contact Cygnus using the information given below: Cygnus Solutions 1325 Chesapeake Terrace Sunnyvale, CA 94089 USA +1 408 542 9600 hotline: +1 408 542 9601 email: `info AT cygnus DOT com' fax: +1 408 542 9699 -- Want to unsubscribe from this list? Send a message to cygwin-unsubscribe AT sourceware DOT cygnus DOT com