Date: Tue, 20 Oct 1998 12:21:41 -0700 From: Mike Smith <mike@smith.net.au> To: Christopher Masto <chris@netmonger.net> Cc: hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: Producing non-GPLed tools for FreeBSD Message-ID: <199810201921.MAA00548@dingo.cdrom.com> In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 20 Oct 1998 10:20:29 EDT." <19981020102029.A14879@netmonger.net>
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> On Mon, Oct 19, 1998 at 01:09:54PM -0600, Brett Glass wrote: > > At 12:00 PM 10/19/98 -0700, Mike Smith wrote: > > > > >libbfd is the binary file descriptor library; it contains primitives > > >for reading and writing the various file formats that binutils > > >supports. as, ld and ar all use it for manipulating their files. > > > > Hmm. I could write some code that used it to generate samples, then > > emulate what it did. Awkward, though. And a shame that I'd have > > to reinvent the wheel. That's what open source software is supposed > > to avoid! > > Ah, but to those who believe in the RMS-style free software > philosophy, the goal is to have free software, not to be able to > borrow free code for use in proprietary programs. Whether you believe > that way or not, I think this is a demonstration that the GPL at least > partly achieves that goal. If your intention were to write free > software, you would be able to use the work of those who wrote GNU > binutils. They made those programs, and they have a right to > establish the conditions under you can use and distribute them, and > those conditions require that they remain free. The hypocrisy comes from misleadingly calling this "free". If it were truly free, Brett could do what he liked with it. In point of fact, GPL'ed code is no more "free" than proprietary code. -- \\ Sometimes you're ahead, \\ Mike Smith \\ sometimes you're behind. \\ mike@smith.net.au \\ The race is long, and in the \\ msmith@freebsd.org \\ end it's only with yourself. \\ msmith@cdrom.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-hackers" in the body of the message
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