From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 28978 invoked by alias); 18 Apr 2012 20:31:03 -0000 Received: (qmail 28922 invoked by uid 22791); 18 Apr 2012 20:30:48 -0000 X-SWARE-Spam-Status: No, hits=0.9 required=5.0 tests=AWL,BAYES_00,KHOP_THREADED,RCVD_IN_BRBL_LASTEXT,RCVD_IN_HOSTKARMA_YE,RCVD_IN_NJABL_RELAY,T_RP_MATCHES_RCVD X-Spam-Check-By: sourceware.org Received: from new.toad.com (HELO new.toad.com) (209.237.225.253) by sourceware.org (qpsmtpd/0.43rc1) with ESMTP; Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:30:31 +0000 Received: from new.toad.com (localhost.localdomain [127.0.0.1]) by new.toad.com (8.12.9/8.12.9) with ESMTP id q3IKUScF011625; Wed, 18 Apr 2012 13:30:28 -0700 Message-Id: <201204182030.q3IKUScF011625@new.toad.com> To: Tom Tromey cc: Pedro Alves , Jan Kratochvil , gdb@sourceware.org Subject: Re: Can it really be ok to map GPL'd code into any old process? In-reply-to: <87d374pzqt.fsf@fleche.redhat.com> References: <20120330161403.GA17891@host2.jankratochvil.net> <87aa2rjkb8.fsf@fleche.redhat.com> <4F832D5B.9030308@redhat.com> <87d374pzqt.fsf@fleche.redhat.com> Comments: In-reply-to Tom Tromey message dated "Wed, 18 Apr 2012 14:10:50 -0600." Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2012 20:31:00 -0000 From: John Gilmore X-IsSubscribed: yes Mailing-List: contact gdb-help@sourceware.org; run by ezmlm Precedence: bulk List-Id: List-Subscribe: List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: , Sender: gdb-owner@sourceware.org X-SW-Source: 2012-04/txt/msg00139.txt.bz2 > It seems to me that we must have a licensing issue here. > Can it really be ok to map GPL'd code into any old process? I think you can map it without trouble (just as you can mmap a text file into a process address space, regardless of its copyright). Or GDB can mmap a propriatary executable into its address space in order to read its symbols, read or patch its object code, or run it in a simulator. The problem, if any, is that you can't *link* GPL code to proprietary code (except system libraries). FSF took the position (with NeXT) that you can't even do that dynamically, if your goal is to circumvent the GPL (which WAS NeXT's goal). Ultimately it isn't up to FSF to decide what copyright law allows you to do -- it's the courts that would figure out whether linking or mmap-ing GPL'd code to proprietary code produces a derived work (and thus one whose copyright is derived from the copyright on the GPL'd code). So far I think it's pretty clear that static linking produces a derived work. I don't think the courts have ruled about dynamic linking. John