Xref: utzoo comp.os.mach:26 gnu.misc.discuss:180
Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cornell!uw-beaver!uw-uw-june!pardo
From: pardo@uw-june.cs.washington.edu (David Keppel)
Newsgroups: comp.os.mach,gnu.misc.discuss
Subject: Re: Query: Status of Mach cleanout?
Message-ID: <9056@uw-june.cs.washington.edu>
Date: 22 Aug 89 20:04:21 GMT
References: <12720001@eecs.nwu.edu> <1311000001@upba>
Reply-To: pardo@june.cs.washington.edu (David Keppel)
Followup-To: gnu.misc.discuss
Organization: University of Washington, Computer Science, Seattle
Lines: 30

In article <1311000001@upba> damon@upba.UUCP writes:
>[I hope that CMU finishes alpha test of the freely-distributable Mach
> kernel soon.  I am wondering about the restrictions FSF will place
> on such a kernel.  I can see a copyleft that requires any program
> run on this kernel to be freely distributable.  This is the problem
> with gcc.]

GNU will require that ``their'' version of the Mach kernel be freely
distributable.  They will not require all programs run on it to be
freely distributable, because the programs will not be derived from
the GNU Mach kernel.

The `problem' with gcc is often misunderstood.  A program compiled
with gcc is not considered to be a ``derived'' work, and therefore is
not subject to the copyleft.  A program that uses part of gcc (for
example is linked with the compiler) *is* derived from gcc and IF it
is distributed at all, it must be freely distributable.  A program
that is distributed *linked* with the GNU runtime libraries must be
freely distributable.  If the program is distributed unlinked, then
the user can linke with *any* standard libraries, and the program is
not derived.

Whew, I hope that was clear!

Followups to gnu.misc.discuss.

	;-D on  ( To the appropriate GNUs group )  Pardo
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