Letters to the editor

SCO, Linux and the GPL

From:		ketil@ii.uib.no (Ketil Z. Malde)
To:		letters@lwn.net
Subject:		SCO, Linux and the GPL
Date:		08 Aug 2003 13:03:00 +0200

Hi,

Don't you lose the rights granted by the GPL if you don't abide by its
terms?  Say, if you redistribute a GPL'ed piece of software on the
condition of a per-CPU license fee from all users, don't you lose the
right to use said piece of software?

>From the GPL:

|  4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
|  except as expressly provided under this License.  Any attempt
|  otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
|  void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this
|  License.

If somebody were to distribute or sublicense, say, the Linux kernel in
a non-compliant way, could they still legally run their web server on
Linux?

    http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph/?host=sco.com

-kzm
-- 
If I haven't seen further, it is by standing in the footprints of giants

Comments (4 posted)

SCOs IP Chart?

From:		Greg Wilkins <gregw@mortbay.com>
To:		letters@lwn.net
Subject:		SCOs IP Chart?
Date:		Wed, 13 Aug 2003 19:26:45 +1000

SCO publishes a chart of the Unix IP as they see it:

   http://www.sco.com/scosource/unixtree/unixhistory01.html

The interesting thing here is that they show at least two
arrows from linux to UnixWare and no arrows going the
other direction.

So this chart shows that something from linux 2.2.16 and something
from linux 2.4.0 test1 was contributed to UnixWare. I'm wondering how
this was done considering the terms of the GPL?


-- 
Greg Wilkins<gregw@mortbay.com>             Phone/fax: +44 7092063462
Mort Bay Consulting Australia and UK.          http://www.mortbay.com

Comments (none posted)