[uClibc]LEGAL: LGPL vs. proprietary.

[Erik Andersen]

On Wed Jul 25, 2001 at 09:51:01AM -0400, Tom Cameron wrote:
> Tom,
> 	It is my belief, and someone PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong, that
> you may distribute the source that you used in uClibc, while keeping _your_
> source closed.  uClibc is licensed under GPL, but that doesn't mean you have
> to do the same for your application.  Again, PLEASE, if I'm wrong let me
> know!  Anyway, good luck.  For information straight from the Horse's mouth,
> I'd contact the people at the address included in the source comments. Good
> luck!

uClibc is licensed under the LGPL -- not the GPL as stated above.  To clarify
things, lets read the facts from the source; quoting from the LGPL:

	"If you link a program with the library, you must provide complete
	object files to the recipients so that they can relink them with the
	library, after making changes to the library and recompiling it.  And
	you must show them these terms so they know their rights."

So to clarify, you may create closed source applications using uClibc without
any problem.  If you link your closed source application so it uses uClibc as a
shared library, then the only source code you need to share would be the source
code to any changes you made to the uClibc library.

If you staticly link vs uClibc, you must make available to your clients
(somewhere, somehow)$ the object file(s) you linked vs uClibc so that if people
fix a bug in uClibc, they could then relink the final application to produce a
bug fixed binary (provided that their bug fixing does not break binary
compatiility).  

Provided you do these things, you can make all the closed source applications
you want using uClibc.  That was one of the reasons I made sure uClibc was
LGPL, to ensure that closed source applications would be possible.

 -Erik

--
Erik B. Andersen   email:  andersen at lineo.com
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