Re: A question about GCC license

[Andrew Haley <aph at redhat dot com>]

Shlomy Marom wrote:
> Hi guys,
> 
> I've read the full license in gcc's site
> (http://gcc.gnu.org/onlinedocs/libstdc++/manual/bk01apds02.html#gpl-2-0)
> and I still have some open questions, since I got confused by section 3
> (see below ***)
> 
> The license in section 3 says that under the GPL it is possible to
> distribute the "Program" (under certain conditions).
> From this section it sounds like it is OK to distribute the
> executable/binary form (if you do one of the 3 things outlined in the
> section).

OK, but understand we are not lawyers, and you should consult
your own counsel.

> So here is my question to you:
> I'm working on AIX 5.3.
> Since our application needs to deal with exceptions (throw & catch), the
> only way we could make it work is by using shared libstdc++ (otherwise
> the exception couldn't be caught)
> Since we use shared-lib, we need the following files for out application
> to function correctly:
> - libstdc++.a
> - libgcc_s_pthread.a

No, you need the .so versions.

> Is there any legal way to distribute these libs, without being forced to
> open our source? (I don't want to enforce my customers for fetching
> these libs...)

Read this paragraph:

// As a special exception, you may use this file as part of a free software
// library without restriction.  Specifically, if other files instantiate
// templates or use macros or inline functions from this file, or you compile
// this file and link it with other files to produce an executable, this
// file does not by itself cause the resulting executable to be covered by
// the GNU General Public License.  This exception does not however
// invalidate any other reasons why the executable file might be covered by
// the GNU General Public License.

It's at the top of the libstdc++ source files.

Andrew.