Re: Question concerning bundling cygwin with another application

[Corinna Vinschen <corinna-cygwin@cygwin.com>]

Hi Nils,

On Jul 20 20:04, NBroenner@gmx.de wrote:
> Dear Sir or Madam,
> 
> i'm currently developing a non-commerical software under GPL for my 
> modell railroad. It uses SRCP as a client, a protocoll for controlling 
> model railroads. The only SRCP-Server available is the SRCPD which is 
> written for Linux/Unix/Cygwin. Now i want to bundle the compiled SRCPD 
> (non-commerical open source, can be found under www.sf.net) with the 
> cygwin-dlls and the bash.exe to run it. Here are the needed dlls/exes:
> 
>    * cygintl-8.dll
>    * cygioperm-0.dll
>    * cygreadline6.dll
>    * cygwin1.dll
>    * cygxml2-2.dll
>    * cygz.dll
>    * bash.exe
> 
> Now my questions:
> 
>    * Is it possible to bundle these dlls, since both projects are under
>      GPL and non-commercial ? What do i have to do (f.e. Should i
>      mention cygwin somewhere ....) ?

It's possible.  You have to provide the source codes of all GPLed DLLs
and EXEs the same way you provide the binaries.  It's *not* enough to
provide just links to the homepages of these projects.  You have to
provide the source code by your own means.  If you provide the binaries
by CD, you should provide the sources on the CD, too.  If you provide
the binaries on your own home page, you should provide the sources on
your own home page, too.

However, since there can be only one Cygwin DLL on a system, we're
generally not happy with third-parties providing their own, bundled
version of the Cygwin DLL, because this additional DLL potentially
breaks a Cygwin distribution installation.  The Cygwin mailing list is
full of questions of users whos installation broke because a third-party
product came with its own Cygwin DLL.  We would rather see you provide
your package by itself and ask users to make a simple Cygwin
distribution install beforehand (just point to the Cygwin home page
where users will find setup.exe).

If you think you can't do without creating a custom package with its own
Cygwin DLL, please make at least sure that you

  - don't install the DLL into the standard Windows search path
    (C:\Windws\systems32 etc.), but keep it encapsulated in your own
    project directory.

  - don't add your project directory to $PATH, otherwise you *do* break
    a standard Cygwin distribution install.

Please send further discussion mails to the Cygwin mailing list cygwin
AT cygwin DOT com.  For your convenience I've set the reply-to
accordingly.

>    * Which apps / dlls etc are not meant to be used that way (to be
>      bundled with GPL-SW, f.e.) ?

None of the above.


HTH,
Corinna

-- 
Corinna Vinschen                  Please, send mails regarding Cygwin to
Cygwin Project Co-Leader          cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Red Hat