Re: using GPL api to be used in a properietary software

[Isaac]

On Thu, 17 Mar 2005 13:02:36 +0100, Martin Dickopp 
<expires-2005-04-30@zero-based.org> wrote:
> Isaac <isaac@latveria.castledoom.org> writes:
> 
>> On Wed, 16 Mar 2005 17:39:11 +0100, Martin Dickopp 
>> <expires-2005-04-30@zero-based.org> wrote:
>>> You can read about the position of the FSF here:
>>> 
>>>   http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#MereAggregation
>>> 
>>> In particular, if the separate GPL'ed executable has no purpose on its
>>> own, but is created solely to circumvent the license of the library,
>>> then it is *not* okay.
>>
>> The quoted link seems to suggest that using pipes as IPC and execing a
>> GPLed binary is a satisfactory work around.
> 
> Not at all:
> 
>| By contrast, pipes, sockets and command-line arguments are
>| communication mechanisms *normally* used between two separate
>| programs.
> 
> (Emphasis mine.)
> 
> That suggests to me that the /mechanism/ of communication provides
> some hints...
> 
>| But if the semantics of the communication are intimate enough,
>| exchanging complex internal data structures, that too could be
>| a basis to consider the two parts as combined into a larger
>| program.
> 
> ...but that the /semantics/ of communication is really decisive.

That might be a fair interpretation except that dynamic linking is
pretty much rules out even without taking semantics into account.  IMO
that plus the willingness to accept pipes and command-line arguments
as normally ok adds up to an unjustified reliance on the mechanism
of communication. 

Isaac