From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S264372AbTLETXi (ORCPT ); Fri, 5 Dec 2003 14:23:38 -0500 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S264373AbTLETXi (ORCPT ); Fri, 5 Dec 2003 14:23:38 -0500 Received: from mail.scitechsoft.com ([63.195.13.67]:34176 "EHLO mail.scitechsoft.com") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S264372AbTLETXf (ORCPT ); Fri, 5 Dec 2003 14:23:35 -0500 From: "Kendall Bennett" Organization: SciTech Software, Inc. To: Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu Date: Fri, 05 Dec 2003 11:25:01 -0800 MIME-Version: 1.0 Subject: Re: Linux GPL and binary module exception clause? CC: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Message-ID: <3FD06B0D.23426.482772AC@localhost> In-reply-to: <200312051909.hB5J9fps019007@turing-police.cc.vt.edu> References: Your message of "Fri, 05 Dec 2003 10:44:02 PST." <3FD06172.28193.4801EF18@localhost> X-mailer: Pegasus Mail for Windows (v4.02) Content-type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-transfer-encoding: 7BIT Content-description: Mail message body Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org Valdis.Kletnieks@vt.edu wrote: > On Fri, 05 Dec 2003 10:44:02 PST, Kendall Bennett said: > > > Right, and by extension of the same argument you cannot use kernel > > headers to create non-GPL'ed binaries that run IN USER SPACE! Just > > because a program runs in user space does not mean that it is not a > > dervived work. > > That's a bad idea for technical reasons too - how often do we have > to tell people not to use kernel headers from userspace? > glibc-kernheaders (and whatever non-RedHat boxes call it) exists > for a reason. > > Interestingly enough, at least on my Fedora box, 'rpm -qi' reports > glibc as LGPL, but glibc-kernheaders as GPL, which seems right to > me - linking against glibc gives the LGPL semantics as we'd want, > but forces userspace that's poking in the kernel to be GPL as a > derived work.... If glibc-kernheaders (used only if you do not have real kernel source code installed) is GPL, and many of the standard Linux include files end up including either headers from glibc-kernheaders (or the real Linux kernel source if you have it installed and symlinked), then by extension the glibc library built for Linux must be GPL as would all programs linked against it. Regards, --- Kendall Bennett Chief Executive Officer SciTech Software, Inc. Phone: (530) 894 8400 http://www.scitechsoft.com ~ SciTech SNAP - The future of device driver technology! ~