[Colin Paul Adams] Re: [Haskell-cafe] base-4 + gtk2hs-0.10.0 licensing

[Colin Paul Adams]

>>>>> "Wolfgang" == Wolfgang Jeltsch <g9ks157k at acme.softbase.org> writes:

    Wolfgang> Am Mittwoch, 25. Februar 2009 14:33 schrieb Duncan
    Wolfgang> Coutts:
    >> Note that some people will tell you that by a strict
    >> interpretation of the LGPL that statically linked Haskell libs
    >> under that license are a pain in the backside. When we decided
    >> on that license for gtk2hs that was not our intention. In other
    >> words nobody is going to sue you if you statically link gtk2hs
    >> libs. Of course if you need a cast iron legal guarantee then
    >> that's not good enough and you'd have to ship .a and .o files
    >> to let users relink if they wanted to.

    Wolfgang> I’m not sure whether this would be enough. .a and .o
    Wolfgang> files are not compatible among GHC versions, as far as I
    Wolfgang> know. Relinking against newer Gtk2Hs versions might not
    Wolfgang> work. And a program using Gtk2Hs contains code from the
    Wolfgang> .hi files of Gtk2Hs through inlining. So it’s not pure
    Wolfgang> linking. However, the LGPL only allows linking, as far
    Wolfgang> as I understand.

    Wolfgang> I want to repeat what I’ve said earlier on this list:
    Wolfgang> For Haskell, there is no real difference between LGPL
    Wolfgang> and GPL, as far as I understand it. If you don’t want to
    Wolfgang> force the users of your library to use an open source
    Wolfgang> license for their work then use BSD3 or a similar
    Wolfgang> license for your library.

But IF there is no difference between LGPL and GPL for Haskell
programs, then the licensing of gtk2hs as LGPL is just a smokescreen -
it is effectively GPL, so you have to license your program as GPL.

Which I'm all in favour of :-)
-- 
Colin Adams
Preston Lancashire