* Ian Lance Taylor: >>> Your argument here seems to be that linking against libgcc makes a >>> program be covered by the definition of "GCC" in the runtime library >>> license. >> >> Right. Why do you think this would not be the case? libgcc is part >> of GCC, so a program linking to libgcc is a derivative work of libgcc, >> and therefore GCC. That's precisely why we need an exception in the >> first place because this outcome is not desired (a free operating >> system could not distribute compiled binaries of C++ programs using >> OpenSSL, for instance--in contrast to proprietary operating systems, >> the system library exception cannot be used). > > That is the cycle which the runtime library license is intended to > break, so now I'm just confused.
For the self-hosting compiler linking against libgcc, the exception basically says that the compiler qualifies for the linking exception if it qualifies for the linking exception. I think this *is* confusing, and I don't know what it means for the status of the compiler (e.g., if a hypothetical QPL-licensed ocamlopt.opt compiler linking against libgcc would be legal to redistribute or not).
