[ocamlsdl-devel] License terms

[<fre...@fr...>]

Hi all,

It's been a long time since I ever wrote something on this 
mailing-list. I've been quite busy the last couple of years and I've 
been involve in different project. But I kept watching what you did on 
OCamlSDL and I'm pretty amazed to see the work done so far.

By the way. I've just received an e-mail from Michael Benfield about 
the license terms of OCamlSDL. The OCamlSDL library have been put under 
the license terms of the LGPL but according to Michael this is 
restrictive in regard to static linking.

Here is a copy of his e-mail:

"The OCaml libraries themselves are distributed under the LGPL but with 
a modification to allow for static linking. OCamlSDL is distributed 
under the plain LGPL. Unfortunately, this is a problem. The LGPL 
disallows static linking, and the native OCaml compiler cannot really 
dynamically link to OCaml code. This means that if someone wants to 
distribute his native OCaml program using your library, he must 
distribute his program under the LGPL or the GPL - essentially meaning 
your license has the effect of the GPL.

I request that you change the license terms to allow for static linking.

In fact, I believe license terms of LGPL'ed libraries should allow 
static linking even for non-OCaml programs. After all, the purpose of 
the LGPL is to:
1. Keep the original work itself and versions of the original work free 
software
2. Allow other works to use the original work and yet be distributed 
under other terms

Prohibiting static linking does not help the first goal, and it hinders 
the second goal."

I told me that OCaml distributions includes the following text in its 
licence:

"As a special exception to the GNU Library General Public License, you
may link, statically or dynamically, a "work that uses the Library"
with a publicly distributed version of the Library to produce an
executable file containing portions of the Library, and distribute
that executable file under terms of your choice, without any of the
additional requirements listed in clause 6 of the GNU Library General
Public License.  By "a publicly distributed version of the Library",
we mean either the unmodified Library as distributed by INRIA, or a
modified version of the Library that is distributed under the
conditions defined in clause 3 of the GNU Library General Public
License.  This exception does not however invalidate any other reasons
why the executable file might be covered by the GNU Library General
Public License."

Do you have any ideas about that?

Thank for all and keep up the good work. :)

-- 
Frederic Brunel