From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Received: (from majordomo@localhost) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) id GAA01850; Fri, 9 Nov 2001 06:50:31 +0100 (MET) X-Authentication-Warning: pauillac.inria.fr: majordomo set sender to owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr using -f Received: from concorde.inria.fr (concorde.inria.fr [192.93.2.39]) by pauillac.inria.fr (8.7.6/8.7.3) with ESMTP id GAA02194 for ; Fri, 9 Nov 2001 06:50:30 +0100 (MET) Received: from maru (MARU.REM.CS.CMU.EDU [128.237.163.21]) by concorde.inria.fr (8.11.1/8.10.0) with ESMTP id fA95oTj19806 for ; Fri, 9 Nov 2001 06:50:29 +0100 (MET) Received: from md5i by maru with local (Exim 3.32 #1 (Debian)) id 1624YY-0007ao-00 for ; Fri, 09 Nov 2001 00:50:22 -0500 To: Caml-list Subject: Re: [Caml-list] License Conditions for OCaml References: <20011108232434.Y73712-100000@fledge.watson.org> From: Michael Welsh Duggan Date: Fri, 09 Nov 2001 00:50:22 -0500 In-Reply-To: <20011108232434.Y73712-100000@fledge.watson.org> (Patrick M Doane's message of "Thu, 8 Nov 2001 23:30:56 -0500 (EST)") Message-ID: User-Agent: Gnus/5.090004 (Oort Gnus v0.04) Emacs/21.1.50 (i686-pc-linux-gnu) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Sender: owner-caml-list@pauillac.inria.fr Precedence: bulk Patrick M Doane writes: > Earlier this year there was a discussion about the problems of using LGPL > for the OCaml run-time system and associated libraries. > > It was suggested that some of the constraints in the LGPL were not > intended. To quote a page from the Caml website: > > "The LGPL puts no restrictions at all on programs linked with LGPL-ed > libraries. Thus, users are free to distribute (or not) OCaml-generated > binaries under whatever conditions they like." > > From my reading of the LGPL, which seems to correspond with the > opinions of others on the list, this just isn't true. I agree. The LGPL does put some conditions on the binaries. For example, they must be accompanied by a copy of the LGPL license. But this license is *for the Ocaml libraries linked in*, not for the whole binary. > If I develop an application with OCaml, I must distribute that > application with source code. This isn't acceptable for commercial > development and I'd really hope that the intention is for OCaml to > be used outside of academia. I suggest you read section 6 of the LGPL a little more closely. I have to be able to produce on demand source code for ocaml and its libraries, but not for the work itself. I do have to distribute the work in such a way that ocaml and its libraries could change and be relinked. "For an executable, the required form of the "work that uses the Library" must include any data and utility programs needed for reproducing the executable from it." It should be sufficent to distibute all the precompiled *.cm* files of the binary in the distribution. These could be linked with a modified set of ocaml libraries to create a new program, but the source to the application need not be shipped. -- Michael Duggan (md5i@cs.cmu.edu) ------------------- Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs FAQ: http://caml.inria.fr/FAQ/ To unsubscribe, mail caml-list-request@inria.fr Archives: http://caml.inria.fr