Re: Qt/XEmacs vs. the GPL (was: Re: kde-xemacs or gnome-xemacs?)
Per Abrahamsen <abraham(a)dina.kvl.dk> writes:
Traditionally, the FSF has ignored violations when people have
linked with non-GPL compliant free software. I have no idea if
this will begin to include QPL now that it has become free
software.
RMS's message to gnu.misc.discuss when Troll Tech changed the QPL seemed to
indicate that the FSF would grudgingly accept linking with QT [1]
Subject: On the QPL
Date: 1998/11/21
Author: Richard Stallman <rms(a)gnu.org>
The latest news about Qt is that Troll Tech has proposed to rerelease it
under a new license, the QPL. This license would make Qt free software;
there would no longer be a principled reason to reject using it, and thus
no principled reason to reject using KDE. Indeed, if Qt is Troll Tech's
only product (which might be so; I don't know), then by a strange
reversal, this would actually make them a free software company.
However, the QPL has major practical drawbacks: source modifications can
be released only in the form of patches, and it is incompatible with the
GNU GPL. This means that linking existing GPL-covered software with Qt
would require giving special permission.
With Qt being free software, there would be no fundamental reason to
refuse this special permission, but it remains better if we can avoid it.
As a practical matter, it will be preferable to use Harmony, both to
avoid the need to make special exceptions, and to avoid the practical
inconvenience of the requirement to distribute modifications patches.
--- Alastair
Footnotes:
[1]
http://x47.deja.com/[ST_rn=ap]/getdoc.xp?AN=414217499&CONTEXT=9353070...