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From: phr@soda.berkeley.edu (Paul Rubin)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.bsd
Subject: Re: Restrictions on free UNIX / 386BSD (Re: selling 386BSD)
Message-ID: <PHR.92Aug17195332@soda.berkeley.edu>
Date: 18 Aug 92 00:53:32 GMT
References: <PHR.92Aug15151100@soda.berkeley.edu> <63DILTJ@taronga.com>
<PHR.92Aug15214245@soda.berkeley.edu> <YSDIBS4@taronga.com>
<9208162341.30@rmkhome.UUCP> <PHR.92Aug17112028@soda.berkeley.edu>
<9208171721.29@rmkhome.UUCP>
Organization: CSUA/UCB
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In-reply-to: rmk@rmkhome.UUCP's message of Mon, 17 Aug 1992 22:21:27 GMT
But some lawyers believe that the use of GCC to develop proprietary
applications that are shipped "binary only" may be hazardous to a
companies legal health. The GPL has not been tested deeply in court.
The FSF has stated in numerous publications that GCC *output* is
not covered by the GPL. I don't remember whether the GPL itself
states this specifically; maybe it should.
Note that some routines in the FSF-distributed C library are
copylefted and can't be shipped linked into a binary-only product
except in some conditions. Cygnus and others offer non-copylefted
free libraries that sidestep this issue for developers.