Sean <seanlkml@sympatico.ca> wrote:<blockquote class="replbq" style="border-left: 2px solid rgb(16, 16, 255); margin-left: 5px; padding-left: 5px;"> On Thu, 15 Jun 2006 10:40:42 -0500 Les Mikesell <lesmikesell@gmail.com> wrote: > On Thu, 2006-06-15 at 09:50 -0400, Sean wrote: > It is the FSF's interpretation that anything that needs a GPL'd > library to function is a derived work of that library even when > distributed separately . I'm sure that with sufficient funds > you could find well-trained lawyers to argue either side of > that case, but it sounds like insanity to me that you can violate > a copyright without copying the material in question. Or that > whether a violation exists or not depends on whether or not a > functionally equivalent library exists under a different license, > something that none of the parties involved might not know and > that could change without their involvement or knowledge. Well it makes sense to me that if you're building a program that relies on a library, that it is a derived work of that library. But i'm not a lawyer. ftware. Sean -- </lesmikesell@gmail.com></blockquote> I keep seeing the term 'derived' used a lot in these GPL discussions. Hum, I'm not a lawyer, but as a computer programmer I fail to see how an application program that I write could be considered a 'derived' work of some generic support library that knows nothing of the logic of my application program. Here is a dictionary definition definition of derived (I realize that lawyers can ever pervert that): formed or developed from something else; not original; "the belief that classes and organizations are secondary and derived"- John Dewey <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&start=0&oi=define&q=http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn%3Fs%3Dderived">wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn</a> How could by application be derived by this definition? The library routine is only there to do a function or to supply data that my program needs. My program is not formed from this GPL library in question.