From: Curt Hibbs Date: 2001-10-31T06:33:17+09:00 Subject: [ruby-talk:23867] Re: Ruby's use of cygwin and commercial use! Perhaps this will help... I found this on a cygwin/XFree86 web page (http://sources.redhat.com/cygwin/xfree/): Cygwin is licensed under a modified GNU General Public License that specifically allows libcygwin1.a to be linked to programs that are licensed under an Open Source compliant license without such linking requiring that those Open Source programs be licensed under the GNU General Public License (see the Cygwin licensing page for more information). Source code and binaries for both projects are freely available. The cygwin licensing page can be found at: http://cygwin.com/licensing.html Curt -----Original Message----- From: Benoit Cerrina [mailto:benoit.cerrina@writeme.com] Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2001 12:35 PM To: ruby-talk ML; undisclosed-recipients: Subject: [ruby-talk:23865] Re: Ruby's use of cygwin and commercial use! "Phil Tomson" wrote in message news:frsD7.14495$Sl.883633@sjcpnn01.usenetserver.com... > In article <3BDBCDB6.7000901@hotmail.com>, > Sunil Hadap wrote: > >Hi, > > > >I am considering jumping into ruby. I plan to use ruby as embedded > >language for potentially commercial software. I understood the Ruby's > >license. However, for win32, I realized that it uses cygwin. How people > >typically address licensing problem associated with cygwin. Do I have to > >buy license for cygwin.dll and for each copy of it. > > What is the licensing issue with cygwin? As far as I can tell, cygwin is > licensed under the GPL, but I could be wrong. If it's GPL'd you wouldn't > have to buy any license for the dll. There is also minGW as well, which > I believe is also under GPL. > > > > Phil If it is GPL (didn't check) then plenty of problems, you can't link with it even dynamically without becoming GPL which is inacceptable. Mingw32 is another beast since there are no library to link to just the toolsuite and you link to msvcrt.dll. GPL is a viral license meant to propagate like a virus, it doesn't give you any more freedom than communism did. I think Richard Stallman obvious fanaticism shows what its worth. I like the Apache or BSD or perl style licences a lot better. Actually commercial licenses feel more honest and freeer than the GPL to me... Benoit PS anti flame shield up, saying that the GPL didn't make any problem for commercial software was worth this type of answer