Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > Sven Luther <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > >> > Do you think that the QPL without section 6 is a free software >> > licence? >> >> I am tentatively in favor of that, yes. > >> > If YES, how do you argue that section 6 detracts from the permissions >> > granted by section 3? >> >> They do not, since they apply to two different clases of software. > > That seems like a contradiction to me. You seem to be saying that the > QPL without section 6 is a free licence, section 6 does not detract > from the permissions granted by section 3, and yet we have to look at > section 6 in detail to tell whether the QPL is free. How does that > work? > >> What is your argumentation to ignore the above and makes as if modified work >> and linked works are one and the same thing ? > > It looks to me like section 6 grants some additional permission in the > case of mere linking. Without section 6 the entire work would have to > be QPL (with a licence grant to the initial developer). With section 6 > only the part that contains the original software has to be QPL; the > rest can have any free licence, more or less, except that there's an > additional requirement (6c) that might be problematic. > > So the argument here is that the DFSG requires the conditions in QPL 3 > to be acceptable, and if they are, then the DFSG is satisfied and we > don't have to look at QPL 6.
But we do have to look at QPL 6, because there's no way to say "We accept only the parts in 1-5, not 6; this is a modification under 3, not a linking under 6." If I modify *and* distribute, I must obey both of those clauses. Similarly, if I modify *and* link, I must obey both of those. The QPL authors happened to impose extra restrictions on linking, and relax a few restrictions, but I think it's quite a stretch to read this the way you like. In any case, linking is particularly important for OCaml. The OCaml toplevel is under QPL 6, lumped in with the compiler. Common practice is to distribute customized toplevels, which use particular extensions -- unix.cma, for example. It's a common means of extending the language. -Brian -- Brian Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED]
