[ale] OT: GPL Question

Joseph A. Knapka jknapka at earthlink.net
Fri Aug 30 20:02:29 EDT 2002


"Jeffrey B. Layton" wrote:
> 
> Fulton Green wrote:
> 
> >On Fri, Aug 30, 2002 at 06:28:24PM -0400, Jeffrey B. Layton wrote:
> >
> >
> >>Joseph A. Knapka wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >(snip)
> >
> (snip)
> 
>    If I can beg everyone's indulgence, I'd like to ask one
> more seemingly silly question. If I have a Python script
> (Python 2.2 is under the Python Softtware Foundation
> License) that is calling a "module" for a library that
> is GPL (for sake of argument 'kmatplot' at
> kmatplot.sourceforge.net). Since kmatplot is GPL
> doesn't Python using kmatplot modules violate the GPL?
> Is my Python script now GPL? (This is starting to hurt
> head a whole bunch).

The Python license has been declared by the FSF to be
fully GPL-compatible, which as I understand it means that
Python scripts can freely interoperate with any sort of
GPL software without becoming GPL-encumbered. The
Python license is more BSD-ish than GPL-ish; I'm not
sure what changes were made to make it "GPL
compatible".

After reading the entirety of the Asay article, I
have calmed down a lot :-)  He's essentially saying
that the "dynamic linking does not encumber" viewpoint
has been widely adopted by everyone, and as the
FSF has not vociferously objected, that's the view
that will likely prevail, legally. Apparently everyone
and his brother in the embedded world is jumping
on Linux like a... like... like something that
likes something else so much that it jumps on it :-P

-- Joe
  "I'd rather chew my leg off than maintain Java code, which
   sucks, 'cause I have a lot of Java code to maintain and
   the leg surgery is starting to get expensive." - Me

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