From: ptkwt@... (Phil Tomson)
Date: 2004-07-16T10:22:16+09:00
Subject: Re: Problem using Ruby as script language, which limits its distribution speed

In article <20040715222135.GA15628@student.ei.uni-stuttgart.de>,
Mauricio Fern�ndez  <batsman.geo@yahoo.com> wrote:
>On Fri, Jul 16, 2004 at 02:52:18AM +0900, Phil Tomson wrote:
>> Depends on what you're using Ruby for in your application.  The current 
>> regex engine is GPL, however Onigumura (sp?) the new regex engine (I 
>
>No it's not, it's LGPL (don't know why so many people believe so).
>
>> believe it's included in the 1.9.0 source now) is LGPL and so has less 
>> restrictions.  So you may just have to replace the current regex engine 
>> with Onigumura (aka the new regex engine ;-)
>
>Oniguruma is subject to Ruby's license when used with Ruby.
>

Sorry, I had it kind of backwards.  I guess the old regex engine is 
already under LGPL (which makes me wonder again why there is a problem 
with it?)  and the new regex engine (Onigumura) is under the Ruby license 
which is even less restrictive than LGPL.

I guess the main worry with some interpretations of the LGPL is that if 
you dynamically link to an LGPL module it could subject the rest of your 
code to the LGPL.  I think this may vary from project to project.  Some 
projects like FLTK which is under LGPL explicitly state that you cannot 
use a dynamically linked FLTK with closed-source software - you can 
statically link with it, however, which seems rather odd to me. ( Perhaps 
if you statically linking Ruby to your application is another option?) 

At any rate, if he gets rid of the old regex engine and replaces it with 
Onigumura he should be safe using Ruby as a dll or shared lib.  

Maybe this would be a good project for the Ruby Foundation (is that what 
it's called?) after they get their non-profit status.  They could hire a 
lawyer to look into these issues and issue a definitive statement.  This 
issue comes up periodically, so maybe it would be worth $1000 or so to 
clear it up.  Or, perhaps the EFF or some similar organization would be 
willing to lend some pro-bono help in looking into this.

Phil