C++11 & The Long-Term Viability Of GCC Is Questioned

[frantaylor]

For what it is worth, the GPL is usually only good for users if they know how to compile things themselves or someone is willing to be liable for distribution. I recently built GCC for an obscure platform and someone asked me for binaries. I refused to provide them to him because of the GPL.

So you say that the extra quality that comes from patches pushed upstream, this means nothing to users?

Yes indeed RedHat software generates billions of dollars a year in revenues, and puts themselves into the Dow Jones Industrial average, by selling something that means nothing to their end users.

Maybe you could try to say something that makes less sense, but I think it would be hard.

And by the way, people don't usually BRAG about being butt-wipes. Yes indeed use the work of others for your own ends, and then laugh when asked to be part of the community.

[RealNC]

For what it is worth, the GPL is usually only good for users if they know how to compile things themselves or someone is willing to be liable for distribution.

It's also good for users since they can copy the software and give it to others, even if it's commercial. No EULA stuff to worry about.

[ryao]

People who dislike the GPL are usually not users. The GPL is extremely permissive to users. That's the whole point of it. And that's what makes this license so great. It gives me permission to do virtually everything I could possibly want as a user. That's much more meaningful compared to the "free beer" approach of the BSD license, which is very restrictive.

People who claim that the BSD license is "permissive" seem to not know what they're talking about. How is it permissive if my ability to freely copy (and/or modify) software that uses BSD licensed code is restricted? That is not permissive at all.

And from a programmer's point of view, why on earth would I put countless hours of work in something and then license it under BSD and let everyone sell proprietary products that use my work while I don't get anything (be it payment or code)? If I instead use the GPL, I know that I can get code, or reserve the right to sell a proprietary license instead so I get payment. Compensation in code or money. With the BSD license, you get neither.

So no, the LGPL is not better for libraries. It's a compromise and shouldn't be used if you can avoid it.

For what it is worth, the GPL is usually only good for users if they know how to compile things themselves or someone is willing to be liable for distribution. I recently built GCC for an obscure platform and someone asked me for binaries. I refused to provide them to him because of the GPL.

[RealNC]

People who dislike the GPL are usually not users. The GPL is extremely permissive to users. That's the whole point of it. And that's what makes this license so great. It gives me permission to do virtually everything I could possibly want as a user. That's much more meaningful compared to the "free beer" approach of the BSD license, which is very restrictive.

People who claim that the BSD license is "permissive" seem to not know what they're talking about. How is it permissive if my ability to freely copy (and/or modify) software that uses BSD licensed code is restricted? That is not permissive at all.

And from a programmer's point of view, why on earth would I put countless hours of work in something and then license it under BSD and let everyone sell proprietary products that use my work while I don't get anything (be it payment or code)? If I instead use the GPL, I know that I can get code, or reserve the right to sell a proprietary license instead so I get payment. Compensation in code or money. With the BSD license, you get neither.

So no, the LGPL is not better for libraries. It's a compromise and shouldn't be used if you can avoid it.

[ryao]

I understood the discussion as being about strong copyleft licenses like the GPL and more permissive licenses like the BSD license. This is why I listed LGPL software too.

In any case... MPlayer is GPL. Gecko is GPL. Gnumeric is GPL. Abiword is GPL. LibreOffice was GPL (now LGPL). FFmpeg is GPL. x264 is GPL.

Some of them are also licensed under LGPL, MPL, or other licenses, but none of them is BSD.

Most people who dislike the GPL do not mind the LGPL. :/

If a project uses a GPL licenced library then the rest of the project has to be using a GPL compatible licence, these are licence conditions, not something Richard Stallman personally enforces. Just like he can't force anyone to licence their code under GPL to begin with.

I certainly agree that libraries/components are a poor fit for GPL, in my opinon GPL serves it's purpose mainly when it comes to 'complete' works, like full applications/solutions. Incidentally this is also where GPL is most prevalent. Different licences serve different needs.

Richard Stallman did personally enforce the GPL in at least one instance:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_readline#Implications_of_GNU_readline.27s_GPL_license

The use of the GPL license for the readline library led to the creation of the editline library, which is a BSD-licensed drop-in replacement.

[yogi_berra]

If a project uses a GPL licenced library then the rest of the project has to be using a GPL compatible licence, these are licence conditions, not something Richard Stallman personally enforces.

Nope. The google/oracle java abi decision negated the need to use gpl just because you are using an abi.

[XorEaxEax]

The LGPL cannot be used to force a project to change licenses. That is something that Richard Stallman has done in the past with projects that depended upon GPL-licensed libraries. It is also why there are not many GPL-licensed libraries in use today.

If a project uses a GPL licenced library then the rest of the project has to be using a GPL compatible licence, these are licence conditions, not something Richard Stallman personally enforces. Just like he can't force anyone to licence their code under GPL to begin with.

I certainly agree that libraries/components are a poor fit for GPL, in my opinon GPL serves it's purpose mainly when it comes to 'complete' works, like full applications/solutions. Incidentally this is also where GPL is most prevalent. Different licences serve different needs.

[XorEaxEax]

Fluctuation? Nope.

That article uses the exact same blackducksoftware 'data' which you already linked to, pointless.

[jabl]

Gecko is GPL.

Gecko, and the rest of firefox (and thunderbird, and presumably the rest of mozilla software as well) is nowadays actually MPLv2. Prior to the MPLv2, they used a MPLv1/GPLv2+/LGPLv2.1+ tri-license.

LibreOffice was GPL (now LGPL).

I think libreoffice was LGPLv3 from the start, that was what Sun eventually relicenced OO.org as before the fork. Lately they've relicensed libreoffice to MPLv2 (by rebasing on top of the nowadays Apache-licensed Apache Openoffice), although for some reason the binaries they distribute are, for the time being at least, still LGPLv3.

[LightBit]

Most people have agreed from the start that LGPL is a better choice for libraries. Even Stallman before he changed his mind.

LGPL is stupid, because it distinguish between static and dynamic linking.

If you want to avoid bureaucracy, permissive license is your best choice.