On Tue, Jun 11, 2002 at 04:18:53PM +0100, Simon Marlow wrote:
> I think realistically we have to ditch readline for GHCi and
> use something with a friendlier license. BSD's libedit is
> a possibility.
Here are some less tragic solutions I can think of:
1. Dual-license GHC under _both_ the current GHC license and
the GPL
2. Split GHC into two distinct programs: GHC and GHCi. Put
GHCi under the GPL and GHC under some GPL-compatible
license (like its current BSD license).
Solution #2 should probably be slayed by a +5 Greatsword of
Shuttuping.
Solution #1 is what Perl does (and it's also what I do for my own
software). Pretty clever, really: tell the user she has a choice
of licenses. You can use use the GPL, or you can use this other
funky license if you don't like Mr. GPL.
It's not just a win-win, but a quad-damage-win:
1. User wins because they get a choice of licenses.
2. User wins because they don't have to deal with the GPL if
they don't want to.
3. Developer wins because lots of people like the GPL, and
any development they do with the GPL is guaranteed to go
back to the community. This may not occur all the time if
you only use a permissive license like the BSD license.
3. As a nice bonus, you avoid all this evil stuff about
linking with (L)GPLed libraries, like what's happening
with libreadline now, because your software is licensed
under the GPL.
Maybe Perl can help Haskell in some slightly less evil ways ;).
--
#ozone/algorithm <ozone@algorithm.com.au> - trust.in.love.to.save