Quoting Hendrik Boom (hend...@topoi.pooq.com): [Re-user of LGPLed code revealing his source code or submitting very reverse-engineerable object code:] > The incorporator can do either of these things. He can also > distribute obfuscated object code. The only thing he has to permit is > linking with the independently written lgpl library.
Caution: You cannot determine what a code reuser can and cannot (lawfully) do by reference to the text of a proprietary or open source licence (LGPL or other), nor by reference to FSF's FAQs, for the simple reason that this hinges on a key legal concept, 'derivative work', that is defined by copyright caselaw. It is defined by the courts, and FSF doesn't get a vote. FSF materials argue that this-type linking creates derivative works, whereas this-type linking does not. Unfortunately for this opinion, nothing in caselaw so far has supported this view, and I warn that FSF materials' legal claims tend towards the aspirational: They reflect the way FSF would like decisions to come out, which is not necessarily the same as reality. To understand what 'derivative work' means for software and other copyright-covered works, there's really no alternative but to do enough reading to have basic understanding of copyright law, e.g., read one or two of the credible books on open source licensing. I'm fond of Larry Rosen's book _Open Source Licensing: Software Freedom and Intellectual Property Law_, which is available online in PDF, but there are others: http://rosenlaw.com/open-source-licensing-software-freedom-and-intellectual-property-law/ And it couldn't hurt to read some of the key caselaw. For USA jurisdictions, I link to key texts from http://linuxmafia.com/kb/Licensing_and_Law/ . _______________________________________________ Dng mailing list Dng@lists.dyne.org https://mailinglists.dyne.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/dng
