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Original post by bani
oops, it wasnt visual c, it was one of their SDKs.
full text of the eula is here.
Let's do some annotated reading.
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From the linked EULA
(c) Open Source. Recipients license rights to the Software are conditioned upon Recipient (i) not distributing such Software, in whole or in part, in conjunction with Potentially Viral Software (as defined below); and (ii) not using Potentially Viral Software (e.g. tools) to develop Recipient software which includes the Software, in whole or in part.
This doesn't say that you can't develop GPL software with the SDK - licensing your own code to be released under GPL. It says that you can't develop software that incorporates GPL'd code or is developed with GPL'd tools when incorporating the Software (ie, the SDK). Now why would they say that?
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For purposes of the foregoing, "Potentially Viral Software" means software which is licensed pursuant to terms that: (x) create, or purport to create, obligations for Microsoft with respect to the Software or (y) grant, or purport to grant, to any third party any rights to or immunities under Microsofts intellectual property or proprietary rights in the Software.
Ah. Viral licenses such as the GPL would, supposedly, mandate that not only your source code be released, but that the source to the Software being provided by Microsoft - the SDK - be released as well, and that all released code would fall under the terms of the GPL. Which is moronic as all hell.
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By way of example but not limitation of the foregoing, Recipient shall not distribute the Software, in whole or in part, in conjunction with any Publicly Available Software. "Publicly Available Software" means each of (i) any software that contains, or is derived in any manner (in whole or in part) from, any software that is distributed as free software, open source software (e.g. Linux) or similar licensing or distribution models; and (ii) any software that requires as a condition of use, modification and/or distribution of such software that other software distributed with such software (A) be disclosed or distributed in source code form; (B) be licensed for the purpose of making derivative works; or (C) be redistributable at no charge.
Further explication to make perfectly clear
why these rights are explicitly reserved/not granted to the user (You): the requirements under these viral licenses place responsibility upon code authors that they have not explicitly agreed to. That shouldn't even be legal.
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Publicly Available Software includes, without limitation, software licensed or distributed under any of the following licenses or distribution models, or licenses or distribution models similar to any of the following: (A) GNUs General Public License (GPL) or Lesser/Library GPL (LGPL), (B) The Artistic License (e.g., PERL), (C) the Mozilla Public License, (D) the Netscape Public License, (E) the Sun Community Source License (SCSL), and (F) the Sun Industry Standards License (SISL).
And, just in case you're not smart enough to determine what kinds of licenses specifically are being referred to, here's a couple examples.
That's still a far cry from "forbids you to develop GPL software." Allow me to reiterate: bullshit. Ordinarily, I wouldn't engage in this, but this sort of mis- and disinformation is a disservice to software developers everywhere, and is dishonest in the extreme. Worst of all, it is hypocritical, as it adopts the very techniques that Microsoft has been so demonized among GPL fanatics and their ilk for: Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt predicated on misinterpretation and outright falsehood.
For shame.