[PD] expr alternative

Hans-Christoph Steiner hans at at.or.at
Tue Oct 25 19:10:59 CEST 2011


On Oct 25, 2011, at 10:15 AM, Mathieu Bouchard wrote:

> Le 2011-10-25 à 12:19:00, Max a écrit :
>
>> So what is the situation now that expr could be LGPL instead of  
>> GPL? What does that mean for things like the Apple App Store?
>
> In the end I'm not sure anymore that LGPL would be fine, even though  
> it does look like Apple ships with LGPL libs. (Though it's not  
> impossible they might have rewritten them just to avoid the  
> license...).
>
> There's too much contradiction between comments about it on the web,  
> so, to sort out the subtleties, it would be best to ask the FSF  
> about it.
>
> Well, you could ask Apple too. But I bet that the FSF will give more  
> attention to your question.


The problems are with software that ships from the Apple App Store,  
due to the way that is managed and the Terms of Service. It is the  
management and terms of service of the App Store that conflict with  
the GPL/LGPL.  Apple ships lots of GPL and LGPL software as part of  
Mac OS X and iOS, but that does not touch the Apple App Store, so they  
can be in complete compliance.

So Max, if you are interested in the Apple App Store, I think it is  
incompatible with all FSF licenses, and perhaps all copyleft  
licenses.  The short term answer is to ship your iOS apps outside of  
the App Store, and the real fix is to get Apple to make their App  
Store compatible with copyleft licenses.

.hc


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