Re: OFFTOPIC: binary modules, bad idea!

Konrad Rosenbaum (htw6966@rob.rz.htw-dresden.de)
Wed, 17 Dec 1997 18:47:56 +0100 (NFT)


[cut]
> >
> > Just in case you don't know: some companies don't port their commercial
> > software to linux because the license of the C/C++ library would force
> > them to provide the customer with the source code. No joke!
whoops, this is one of the greatest mistakes commercials ever did - and
because it is so funny they do it again and again - I hear that nearly
the 5th or 6th time this semester (not counted: friends on the street)

GPL and Library GPL do _not_ say that you have to write under GPL if you
USE the library, only if you modify it!
Including it via #include, using it via ldso or linking it into your code
is _not_ modification - it's simply usage - modification would be if you
change the source files of the library and then you're free to distribute
you changed library free and the project that uses it non-free (you just
have to say that they are different projects).....

not that I like this option very much - but it's possible ....

>
> That's the point! They don't want you to know about their hardware. This
> is because they don't want other companies to simply copy it.
>
> But it might be that you want to use some other OS than linux in the
> future or that you update your kernel and the module stuff has changed and
> then you have a driver-binary for all your hardware-devices but they won't
> work anymore. The companies have been busted and you will never get a
> driver working with the actual kernel/OS.
>