Date: Tue, 9 Nov 1999 19:10:27 -0500 (EST) From: "Crist J. Clark" <cjc@cc942873-a.ewndsr1.nj.home.com> To: davids@webmaster.com (David Schwartz) Cc: jrs@enteract.com (John Sconiers), freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: licenses and legal etc. Message-ID: <199911100010.TAA42148@cc942873-a.ewndsr1.nj.home.com> In-Reply-To: <000001bf2a72$37fb2ef0$021d85d1@youwant.to> from David Schwartz at "Nov 8, 1999 09:21:04 pm"
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David Schwartz wrote, [Charset iso-8859-1 unsupported, filtering to ASCII...] > > A few questions about gpl etc. If I base my work of a program off the > > work of another program that is GPL'd can I still use a BSD-like license?? > > Are there any exceptions etc. > > > > JOHN > > Short answer: no. > > The GPL does not give you the right to distribute derived works under any > other license, either more or less restrictive. If you write your code totally from scratch and only use the _concept_ of the original code, you are probably OK. A copyright is not a patent. The algorithm and implementation cannot be copyrighted. So, say, if you look at the code and see how it was done, but then write your own code from scratch (no copying parts, no "paraphrasing" code by just changing varaible names, etc.), you are probably OK... but it is a point that is up for fairly subjective review. Not recommended if there is another way. And I'm not a lawyer, yada-yada. The usual disclaimers. -- Crist J. Clark cjclark@home.com To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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