From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org via listexpand id S263056AbTJEKYQ (ORCPT ); Sun, 5 Oct 2003 06:24:16 -0400 Received: (majordomo@vger.kernel.org) by vger.kernel.org id S263057AbTJEKYQ (ORCPT ); Sun, 5 Oct 2003 06:24:16 -0400 Received: from imladris.demon.co.uk ([193.237.130.41]:62092 "EHLO imladris.demon.co.uk") by vger.kernel.org with ESMTP id S263056AbTJEKYP (ORCPT ); Sun, 5 Oct 2003 06:24:15 -0400 From: David Woodhouse To: Larry McVoy Cc: Rob Landley , andersen@codepoet.org, "Henning P. Schmiedehausen" , Andre Hedrick , linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org In-Reply-To: <20031005010521.GA21138@work.bitmover.com> References: <20030914064144.GA20689@codepoet.org> <20030915055721.GA6556@codepoet.org> <200310041952.09186.rob@landley.net> <20031005010521.GA21138@work.bitmover.com> Message-Id: <1065349414.3157.8.camel@imladris.demon.co.uk> Mime-Version: 1.0 X-Mailer: Ximian Evolution 1.4.5 (1.4.5-2.dwmw2.3) Date: Sun, 05 Oct 2003 11:23:34 +0100 X-SA-Exim-Mail-From: dwmw2@infradead.org Subject: Re: freed_symbols [Re: People, not GPL [was: Re: Driver Model]] Content-Type: text/plain Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-SA-Exim-Version: 3.0+cvs (built Mon Aug 18 15:53:30 BST 2003) X-SA-Exim-Scanned: Yes Sender: linux-kernel-owner@vger.kernel.org X-Mailing-List: linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org On Sat, 2003-10-04 at 18:05 -0700, Larry McVoy wrote: > Yeah, but Linus stating his position about a license doesn't mean diddly. > The kernel is licensed under a license, that license is a contract that > people enter into. To the extent that it is enforceable, that license > determines what happens, Linus can't retroactively decide to interpret > the license a different way. The license can't enforce things which > the law doesn't allow. In particular, the law understands a concept of > a boundary. I agree. Linus' comments on the matter, except of course his original exception for userspace which has been there since 1993, are an irrelevant _interpretation_. All that is relevant is the meaning of the original licence. > And Linus' comments notwithstanding, modules are a pretty > clear boundary. Even the GPL acks this, it knows that anything which > is clearly separable is not covered. This statement is in conflict with the presence of the exception for userspace which precedes the text of the GPL in the Linux COPYING file. The presence of the exception makes it clear that, without such exception, userspace would have been considered to be a derived work in the terminology of the original licence. Otherwise, the exception would of course have been redundant. If userspace would be considered a derived work without explicit exception, then so are kernel modules. They have no such explicit exception, and are hence not permitted. I'll grant you that Linus' witterings in public on the matter would probably prevent him _personally_ from bringing suit against a distributor of binary-only modules, on the principle of equitable estoppel. That doesn't stop me or anyone else from doing so though. -- dwmw2