LGPL for Libraries

Posted 25 May 2001 at 16:50 UTC by sej Share This

For starters, I'm an advocate of fair use and a liberal interpretation of copyright law. I deplore the fact Disney has the legislative clout to extend the term of copyright as fast as Mickey Mouse ages. I feel it is a serious detraction from the quality of community if each new generation is barred from recycling the works of their elders as they struggle to get a foothold in life.

I also think personal sharing of copyrighted material (with a few friends, not the whole Internet) should be facilitated by more than the Sony videotape copying court decision. The ability to have experiences in common with the people you know by sharing a book or movie needs to be defended and upgraded in the digital age.

It is from this perspective that I find it necessary to criticize those who would stretch the power of copyright to restrict the use of a copylefted software library. I am 100% behind the right of the copyright holder to control the creation and dissemination of clearly derivative works. But simply using a library as is, and abiding to the terms for that piece of an aggregrate work should in no way impact the larger work. We would boycott such behavior from Microsoft, why encourage it for anyone else?

I think the principled thing for the FSF to do would be to reverse themselves, and start advocating LGPL for libraries, and GPL for applications. Where does it say the FSF has to act as the sworn enemy of all forms of intellectual property (and all forms of intellectual profiteering), and as a result be willing to go to court to extend the power of the munitions (copyright law) employed by both sides?

What are they really fighting for? Many have dreamed of hyper-efficiency by having all parties do things only one way (their way). Thank goodness nature, science, and politics all conspire to defeat them. If you are an advocate of GPL for libraries, let me ask you if you think it fair to give away something so useful and expect copyright law to govern the behavior of those whose hands it falls into? Seems like entrapment to me, and not a good idea for a movement founded on principles of strengthening community.

I understand the motivation of wanting to share free software without benefiting those who don't share. I don't personally feel that way, but I believe that choice should be available, just like the choice of not wanting to share software without economic compensation. But just as emacs and gcc don't impact the license of software made with their use, a copylefted library should not impact the license of software it is aggregated into in an unmodified fashion.

What if Time-Warner-AOL gives away the ultimate extendable and scriptable multi-media player, then claim an interest in all intricate extensions of it, regardless of whether it is done by Hollywood or the PTA? This is not a perfect analogy for the LGPL/GPL library debate, but if you can successfully defend the use of copyright law for one kind of borderline derivation, won't you have established precedent that others can use as well?

You can argue differently. But I would like to know why.


Another way to look at it., posted 25 May 2001 at 19:00 UTC by Fyndo » (Journeyer)

Another view of the GPL, and LGPL would be that they are a trade, rights in my code, for rights in your code, with additional rights given away as a loss-leader to help build business.

The GPL and LGPL differ in the amount of rights that they confer without requiring compensation, in the form of rights to your code. The LGPl allows linking, while the GPL does not. If, instead of code, we look at it in terms of something that has a longer history of copyright, my point may become clearer.

Suuppose I write a short story. By default, you've got pretty much no rights to use it. I grant a license that allows it to be distributed and/or published by you, by itself, but require payment to include it in an anthology (or create derivative works). Certainly I have not extended the terms of copyright at all. You are being prevented from distributing it combined with other works, regardless of whether the resulting product is derived.

Smilarly, the GPL allows you to distribute the works it covers, but does not allow you to distribute them combined with other works. Well, it grants you additional rights, allowing you to distribute it combined with other works, when the combination is "mere aggregation", and it is not expected that you pay in terms of programs that are "not derived from the Program, and and can be reasonably considered independant and separate works in themselves". You are, in effect, allowed to distribute copies of my story, but not include it in an anthology, but I go out of my way to make sure that selling a separately bound copy as part of a collection of books, without any of the front matter that normally goes into an anthology, doesn't trigger the "anthology exception" to my license.

The LGPL allows inclusion in anthologies (so to speak), but still requires payment for derivative works. It basically, gives away more rights free. It's the discount version, is all. And as such, the FSF does not think you should give things away at fire-sale prices, unless they're necessary to obtain any compensation, perhaps because the program is relatively undifferentiated compared to proprietary offerings, or because it doesn't sell in a large enough volume at the higher price.

The point is, after all, to get paid in as much code as possible :)

Fair use, posted 25 May 2001 at 19:04 UTC by mslicker » (Journeyer)

Depends on your definition of fair use. You start by giving an example of sharing books and movies with others. In software terms the GPL already provides this form of fair use, even more so. I certainly would not last very long at all if set up a company for the mass distribution of Disney movies, yet companies already exist for the mass distribution of free software.

I'm not sure on what basis you arguing use of LGPL for libraries, it is certainly not fair use.

The decision of whether to LGPL or GPL is certainly up to you. In certain cases as the FSF notes, use of LGPL over GPL would be more benifitial to free software. Advocating that all libraries be LGPL would weaken free software not strengthen it. What extra motivation would there be to make something free software when everything your application could possibly be built on doesn't care?

What about someone turning GPL apps into libraries, posted 25 May 2001 at 20:12 UTC by atai » (Journeyer)

As in the case of VirtualDub, where the original GPLed code is in an application, and the company rips part of code out and places them in DLLs?

See, the difference between applications and libraries are not obvious. It is harder to tell for, say, CORBA objects.

The issue is more complicated than just libraries vs. applications.

The Common Good, posted 25 May 2001 at 21:36 UTC by Bram » (Master)

My goal is to further the common good as much as possible. Common sense dictates that the more restrictions you put on something, the less useful it will be, hence I put all my stuff in the public domain.

The GPL is a pain in the ass, and I'm hoping most of it is deemed unenforceable by the courts.

Re: LGPL for Libraries, posted 25 May 2001 at 21:48 UTC by sej » (Master)

atai, I think converting a GPL app to a library would clearly make the library a derivative work, and make the terms of GPL apply without question. I admit I didn't realize that was the case with Vidomi. With that clarification I am supportive of your recent article. But it doesn't alleviate my concern with applying GPL to libraries in the first place.

Fyndo, you seem motivated by "quid pro quo" to share your copylefted code. A sort of shareware with teeth. Fine with me, but why rely on enforcing a contested definition of derivative work to accomplish your goals, when standard contract law would be more direct? Conversely, do you think all those library authors who have used the LGPL discouraged each other along the way, because they allowed for use in proprietary software? :-)

mslicker, I was trying to argue against using the GPL on libraries because I think it will lead to either a) an unnecessary extension of the definition of derivative work (which in practice might feel like user interface copyright when enforced), or b) a weakening of the perceived enforcability of GPL for applications if things go the other way. GPL was necessary to bootstrap the free software movement. LGPL allowed a greater percentage of software developers to contribute and participate, and was a pragmatic and fair compromise that addressed the realities of software libraries (and software library authors). Yes people can choose whatever path they want, but when the FSF uses words like ethically tainted to describe behavior beyond what they advocate, I think it time for others to speak up.

Re: LGPL for Libraries, posted 25 May 2001 at 23:34 UTC by mslicker » (Journeyer)

sej, Ok, I see what you are getting at. I don't think applies though. GPL doesn't cover a particular interface only the software. If I made a GPL licenced libary for OpenGL for example, all applications which use OpenGL would not have to be GPL'd as long as they didn't depend on my implementation. In this example that would most likely be the case since OpenGL is pretty common on different systems now. Here also there wouldn't be that much incentive to make it GPL over LGPL since that would rescrict certain software from being available which would be available on other platforms.

On the other hand, say I make a completely unique GPL'd library, of which it is the only implementation. Someone is free to reimplement the library and make a propreitary program, but is not free to release a propreitary program dependent on my library. This would motivate someone to make more free software, because they would have advantages they wouldn't have in the purely propreitary world of software.

Bram, I agree in general, the less restrictions the better. However, the only thing the GPL prevents is benefiting unfairly someone elses work. That is one restriction I can live with.

Promoting freedom, posted 25 May 2001 at 23:51 UTC by clausen » (Master)

The reason I GPL libraries is it promotes freedom (in the same way it does for programs).

You are arguing that using a library for writing a program ("using a library") is different to writing a program derived from another, and that putting restrictions (to promote freedom) on "using a library" is bad.

I want a "free world". GPLing my libraries promotes this end. This is why we fight copyright and patents, and use these strategies.

WRT copyright law, standard IANAL response: we're not claiming any rights about users of libraries. We're just saying that you have to release under GPL to use them together. If you put your code in the "free world", then you have no problems.

For example, I released libparted (the guts of Parted) under GPL. Free GNU/Linux installers can use it. SuSE got bitten, because their installer isn't free. This is exactly what I want... to reward distributions that give as freedom, and to punish those that don't. (In the end, SuSE went via the parted frontend, sending commands down a pipe. I'm sure this is causing all sorts of headaches ;-)

/dev/clausen

PS: I think most programs should be a library + frontend. So, almost all free software would end up LGPL by your arguments, and it would be trivial to derive non-free front-ends.

Re: LGPL for Libraries, posted 26 May 2001 at 00:53 UTC by sej » (Master)

mslicker, I think you're right in that enforcing the GPL on a completely unique library (like readline) does not fall under the category of user interface copyright enforcement. Enforcing it on something like dynamic linking of an OpenGL variant would equate to that -- but no one is suggesting that. So let us remove that from the discussion.

My main concern is stretching the definition of a derivative work in the process of enforcing the GPL on a library. And a curiosity why those interested in information liberation would want to do that.

Why does it have to be derivative?, posted 26 May 2001 at 15:44 UTC by Fyndo » (Journeyer)

sej If you re-read my arguments, one of the points I was trying to make is that it does not strictly rely on the work being derivative. You may not distribute it without permission, even as part of a "collective work", this is just standard copyright law, without the collective work being necesarially derivative. The GPL grants you the right to use it in a collective work, if either, a) the rest of the work is GPL'ed or b) the rest "can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves,", and then, just to make sure that there's no confusion, it adds:
In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.

Unless you wish to claim that a program requiring a library is independant of the library (which reqires, IMO, a really weird definition of either requires, or independent), you lose your right to distribute the library. If you're not distributing it at all, you might have a case, but there does come a point at which you're obviously outside the intent of the license. Obviously any application can be converted into a library, and then linked to, where would you draw the line? And how?

Yes, as not doing so only leads to more work, posted 26 May 2001 at 16:52 UTC by bagder » (Master)

I couldn't agree more.

The fact is, when people stubornly and almost by-default make their projects GPL, they also in many cases close the door to all those guys who wants to work on free/open software but wants one version of it in their closed or not-entirely-open projects.

I.e, for every GPLed library that fills a strong demand, there is destined to come a more liberally licensed (e.g BSD-like) software...

You might say that you lose freedom by doing so, I say more people can and will contribute when they can use the software more widely.

It's not about more users, posted 26 May 2001 at 17:54 UTC by brg » (Journeyer)

A lot of us are not in this in order for people to use the software more widely. We're hoping to create a rich body of software free from the traditional conditions of redistribution and modification. We do close the door on people who want to grab our code for (partially or wholly) non-free projects, but that's intentional. There are objectives here different from those of filling the greatest demand and getting the most contributors.

If on the other hand there's an argument here that people use the GPL ignorantly, without wanting to help extend the software-sharing community, I can only suggest that that was what a lot of us were hoping would happen all along: the default has changed. :-)

Re: Yes, as not doing so only leads to more work, posted 26 May 2001 at 22:50 UTC by mslicker » (Journeyer)

bagder, I'm not sure why someone would rebuild a free software library under a different free software licence. If you had a proprietary software project and you had to reimplement functionality of GPL'd software in only seems in your best interest to hold onto the code you wrote.

You are right it does make more work for proprietary developers, and that is unfortunate. That's not the fault of GPL'd software, but the fault of companies thinking of software, first and for most, as property and not as a tool.

If we stick to our guns hopefully we change the corporate thinking from "How can we sell more software?" to "What software do we need to get the job done?". This can only create more opportunities for developers to work on free software and get paid!

looking for a person who sees it both ways, posted 27 May 2001 at 00:41 UTC by sej » (Master)

Is there anyone who advocates applying the GPL to libraries whenever possible, yet rejects the claim that any involvement with proprietary software is ethically tainted? And would your motivation for advocating the GPL over the LGPL still exist if the illegal monopolistic behavior of certain software practioners was reined in?

I qualify, posted 27 May 2001 at 15:31 UTC by Fyndo » (Journeyer)

I don't believe that any involvement with proprietary software is ethically tainted, I just do not believe that allowing proprietary software to use free software however they like is a good way to promote free software, and feel that free software is more beneficial to society, and hence, should be promoted.

Doesn't particulary depend on any particular companies behavior, just don't see what's wrong with expecting to be paid in code for the right to use a library. And if expecting to be paid in code is wrong, why is expecting to be paid in cash ok?

IANAL, posted 28 May 2001 at 02:04 UTC by Pseudonym » (Journeyer)

IANAL. Just as well, because I'm a geek. The law simply doesn't think the same way that computers do.

No court is going to accept the argument that a program which uses a library in some non-essential way is a "work based on" the library.

The non-essential thing is important. A web browser which uses a GPL'd HTTP protocol implementation or HTML renderer (in library form) is definitely a "work based on" that other library. Turning an application into a library and writing a small wrapper is definitely a "work based on" the library.

However, an encryption package which uses, say, a GPL'd implementation of a cipher as a plug-in it not necessarily a "work based on" that plug-in. Especially if the package will work file (presumably using some other cipher instead) without said plug-in.

My point is that we geeks think in terms of "all libraries" vs "no libraries". That's not how the law thinks. The law thinks in terms of "substantial" and "essential". These are vacuous concepts which attempt to draw a distinction which defies a simple boolean test.

Unfortunately, this makes grey areas. One example is RMS' own example of a debugger using GNU readline. Is that a "work based on" readline? That's very hard to say. I wish I knew.

Personally, I will not use a GPL'd library in an application which I do not intend to release using a GPL-compatible licence. Partly, I can't afford the legal costs, but more importantly, it would be hypocritical of me to use the licence but not respect the author's wishes as to how it is to be used. By placing a library under the GPL, the author is stating an intention. If I do not agree with that intention, I'll look elsewhere.

Forcing everyone to contribute..., posted 28 May 2001 at 13:22 UTC by bero » (Master)

The GPL enforces that people using the library contribute back (in the form of the code they wrote) - I can see both the reasons why this is a good thing (obviously - more GPLed applications) and why it's a bad thing (if things like glibc or XFree86 were GPL, we wouldn't see much non-free Software on Linux - without things like StarOffice 5.2 or the Loki games, we probably wouldn't be seen as a viable alternative to Microsoft stuff even on the desktop yet. (KOffice and OpenOffice are getting there, but not quite ready yet)).

Middle road: If it's a really large library, GPL it but make different licensing available for a reasonable fee (the way Qt does) -- makes everyone contribute (either in the form of code or in the form of paying people who write the code - if they can drop a different job, it'll help the library) without completely shutting out non-free software.

There are valid reasons for all 3 positions (and even for other options, like BSD-licensing it) - so, consider what you want to do with the code, and pick the right license (and possibly additional terms like optional other licensing) for what you want to do.

Please don't invent yet another license though, this will only cause confusion ("may I link my new GPLed code with code that uses the XYZ license?", "may I merge code from a project under the XYZ license into my GPLed code", ...).

Crypto Libraries, posted 28 May 2001 at 16:55 UTC by Bram » (Master)

Pseudonym: linking to a cipher implementation tends to not be a problem. Since most people who write crypto libraries are not open source zealots and are simply trying to promote crypto usage, they generally use much freeer licenses.

Freedom and contributions when going non-GPL, posted 29 May 2001 at 06:12 UTC by bagder » (Master)

Often when anyone mentions other licenses than GPL or LGPL, people worry about that their code will be "stolen" and used in proprietary solutions without they getting the performed modifications back.

I'd say that risk is present, yes, but in reality very unlikely to occur. Besides, the Evil Company still just rips the code out and uses it without acknowledging the license, as is being seen repeatedly.

On the other side, if they use your stuff in closed-source products, they probably work on it professionally (and thus may be good programmers that can contribute good stuff) and they _want_ to contribute their fixes back to you as they want the main branch of the software to remain easy adaptable for them as they want all (other) bugfixes and improvements you do to the software. I'm sure many authors of projects using BSD-like licenses would agree with me.

So, the question then comes: is it better for me to run my project (L)GPL and have those other guys write their own implementation, or is it better to join the efforts and risk that someone do take disallowed advantage of the code?

Offer a commercial license, posted 29 May 2001 at 13:39 UTC by danwang » (Master)

If the author owns the copyright on the majority of the code. He should just offer a commercial license to the company for that part. The money he recieves can be used to fund development of the GPLed version, which the company may not be able to use, depending on how copyright on modifications is assigned.

Simple, everyone wins...

Grr..., posted 29 May 2001 at 13:40 UTC by danwang » (Master)

I hate it when I post a reply to the wrong article.. please ignore the post above...

stub libraries, posted 29 May 2001 at 22:21 UTC by jmg » (Master)

This reminds me of a discussion a while back on the FreeBSD mailing lists. There is no requirement that the replacement library be fully functional.

So you have a case of a GPL'd library. You write a stub library that pretty much just returns errors upon all calls (or even just aborts()). Then you distribute your software with the stub library. Then the end user can "choose" to use the GPL'd library for their own personal work (they can't make the results available to the public), but since they are using it for personal or internal business use, they are not in violation of the GPL and not required to redistribute the program that makes use of the GPL'd library.

There are always loop holes in such a complex license. The above would be perfectly valid. You did in your original program make no guarantees about how it'd function, so abort()ing is a valid course of action.

Re: stub libraries, posted 30 May 2001 at 01:55 UTC by mslicker » (Journeyer)

The section of the GPL on modification is pretty clear about what you describe:

If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works.

In your example you do not satify the "can be reasonably considered independent and seperate works in themselves" condition, since your program only works in pressence of certain GPL'd code.

bagder, There are certainly advantages and disadvantages to each and every license. However, within the relm of free software licences, I don't think it is very productive to argue in general about which license a project should use. Each project has different intentions, and as many point people here point out the line between library and application is not always clear. If someone is making free software we should already be satisfied and assume that they are intelligent enough to pick the proper license for their project.

If anyone here is a proprietary developer (which I don't taint), and you encounter a piece of GPL'd software you think would be useful, why not contact the author? There is a good chance the developer would be willing to work with you and your company provided you give him/her something in return.

GPL, generalisations and proprietary code, posted 30 May 2001 at 12:13 UTC by bagder » (Master)

mslicker, I agree that "general" discussions about what license to pick is a rather useless thread to re-iterate. I am just in my make-people-aware-of-that-GPL-may-not-be-the-answer-to-everything mood.

When it comes to proprietary code and licenses, you and others in this thread forget something vital:

There is hardly ever only one single author to contact. When there's 24 guys who've contributed code under a certain license, how can the main author switch that for me?

More, I've worked for companies that rejected the software immediately when it was GPL'ed, going for a BSD-version instead.

On the other side of the fense, I've had (proprietary-) people thank me for not using GPL in stuff as that made it possible for them to use my free software in their closed-source products. The same people have since contributed significantly and with quality. Thus, having them as "customers" greatly enhanced the product for all us free persons.

I've also worked on GPL'ed software for companies that the GPL was just ignored in spite of my complaints. I've also worked for companies that actually tried to send back the changes we did to GPL'ed software.

Non-GPL code _has_ been exploited, and often, posted 31 May 2001 at 23:52 UTC by apenwarr » (Master)

Just so people know, there are lots of examples where BSD and MIT-licensed code has been modified by commercial companies, sold for profit, and never donated back, leaving a huge mess.

The specific examples I'm thinking of are BSD itself, X11, and sendmail. Back in the days when commercial Unix actually seemed like a good idea, we had the "Unix wars" in which vendors would take a common code base, add one or two new features or fix bugs or security holes, then release a binary-only version of the new program along with their OS.

What we got was lots of incompatible versions of sendmail, lots of incompatible versions of BSD-like Unix kernels, and lots of weird X11 extensions (Display Postscript and binary-only video drivers, anyone?) that caused portability nightmares.

The most recent example I heard about was the SoftUpdates improvements to the BSD filesystem, which were very clever but which only appeared in one commercial BSD implementation (BSDI, I think). On the other hand, reiserfs on Linux is GPLed because all Linux kernel code has to be.

Dan Bernstein (of qmail fame) is so weird with his licenses probably primarily because of the sendmail disaster. He doesn't want to see his qmail code fork and become a whole bunch of incompatible versions like sendmail did -- IMHO, the GPL actually protects against this, but the BSD license can cause the problems he's worried about.

copyleft is good for society, posted 1 Jun 2001 at 02:25 UTC by atai » (Journeyer)

People argue over BSD vs. GPL. BSD people do not consider proprietary programs using their code bad. Fine.

Simply, GPLed or LGPLed code is good for the general public because it makes the distributed code and derivatives public property, usable by all. (If some code is not distributed, it makes no difference to others whether the code exists or not--web service-type programs are discussions for another day). So while BSD people don't care, users may have good reasons to prefer GPLed or LGPLed code.

Now as to LGPL for libraries, there may be no clear line between libraries and applications--after all, all applications can become libraries invoked from some other applications. If one wants to use a GPLed "software piece" and does not want to have his whole program GPLed, there is always the option of requesting alternative licensing from the original author. One would guess most open source authors will grant permission to other open source authors for using their code...

Re: Non-GPL code _has_ been exploited, and often, posted 1 Jun 2001 at 22:40 UTC by jmg » (Master)

apenwarr: Please read a bit about SoftUpdated before you start to spout off about how it was only included in BSD/OS (remeber, BSDi is the company, BSD/OS is the OS they sell). This is completely false. It has been included as part of FreeBSD for a VERY long time.

Reading the README that was originally committed to the FreeBSD source tree in May 1998 has the following comments about it's license:

Redistributions in any form must be accompanied by information on how to obtain complete source code for any accompanying software that uses the this software. This source code must either be included in the distribution or be available for no more than the cost of distribution plus a nominal fee, and must be freely redistributable under reasonable conditions. For an executable file, complete source code means the source code for all modules it contains. It does not mean source code for modules or files that typically accompany the operating system on which the executable file runs, e.g., standard library modules or system header files.

That sure doesn't sound like a license that is limited to BSD/OS only. I guess you can say it was only included in one commercial OS, but you forgot to mention the FREE OS that it was included with.

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