On Fri, 2006-06-23 at 15:47 -0500, Les Mikesell wrote: > On Sat, 2006-06-24 at 00:59 +0530, Rahul Sundaram wrote: > > > > > > Does that mean that all programs using a kernel interface must > > > be GPL'd now? > > > > Maybe. Whatever GPL says and whatever is decided by the courts if anyone > > decides to challenge it. > > Since things take years to go through the courts, I guess the place > we'll first find out if something automatically falls under the > copyright of the first kernel where it was used is when we find > out what SCO actually owns. SCO related cases are completely orthogonal to the question on what falls under derivative work which is pretty complex and has to be decided on a case by case basis. > > > > That would pretty much render it useless for > > > running commercial applications and has been the specific modification > > > I've seen in the COPYING file distributed with the kernel - but > > > I haven't looked recently... > > > > > > > Which Linus himself has said is not an exception or modification of the > > license. > > He says that now. In the early days he was widely quoted as saying > the opposite but google wasn't around then so I can't just grab > a copy to see the exact context. I thought it was a big reason for > the early popularity of Linux that pre-existing code could be > used in driver modules. As it is now, what is a verifiable claim clearly says that Linux is not under any sort of modified GPL license. Rahul
