[Haskell-cafe] GPL License of H-Matrix and prelude numeric

[Chris Smith]

On Tue, 2011-01-25 at 22:34 -0800, John Millikin wrote:
> The specific claim I'm refuting is that if some library or application
> depends on GPL'd code, that library/application must itself be
> GPL-licensed. This claim is simply not true. The GPL only applies to
> derived works, such as binaries or copied code.

Well, binaries (among other things) are pretty much exactly what's at
issue here.  I don't think anyone disputes that you can copy and paste
sections of BSD3 licensed source code into a new project, but that
wasn't the point brought up.  If you actually install the thing from
Hackage, you build a binary, which links in code from the GPLed library,
and distributing the result is covered by the terms of the GPL.

I definitely interpret the license field in Cabal to refer to the terms
and conditions that govern distribution of the entire program or library
as a unit, including binaries.  If the people to whom I distribute that
program are not free to further distribute it without offering source
code, then I'm not giving it to them under the terms of the BSD3
license; so the license field in Cabal should note that.

> I think you're getting mixed up between a derived work and dependent
> library/application.

I'm fairly sure I'm not mixed up.  I think it may have caused some
confusion that I'm talking about the entire program, and you seem to be
(sometimes, at least) talking about individual pieces of source code.

-- 
Chris Smith