[wellylug] GPL Licence

[David Antliff]

On Wed, 22 Sep 2004 andrej at paradise.net.nz wrote:
>
> So you sample ISP would violate the GPL *ONLY* if
> you asked them to provide you with sources and they
> refused to make them accessible to you.

No, no, they only have to provide source for modifications they have made
(which for most ISPs and hosting sites means *none*).  It's sufficient to
direct the requester to the original publisher (or somewhere else
upstream) for the original unmodified source. The binaries themselves
should contain information on how to obtain the source so this is
covered (or should be).

If you change a GPL program _and_distribute_it_ you are obliged to provide
your changes upon request, as well as provide the original source OR
provide information on where to obtain the original source. This protects
the original author's copyright when derived works are created, which is
the main goal of the GPL.

If you develop something in-house based on the GPL and it remains
in-house, and is never distributed to anyone else, then you don't need to
make the source available. Some "open source" licenses are harsher in this
respect ("all modifications must be published..." etc).

-- 
David