Re: Add GPL compatibility check for plugins

[fche at redhat dot com (Frank Ch. Eigler)]

Diego Novillo <dnovillo@google.com> writes:

> On request from the FSF, I am adding this check.  When a plugin is
> loaded, the compiler checks whether the symbol
> plugin_is_GPL_compatible exists in the loaded shared object.  The
> presence of this symbol asserts that the loaded plugin has been
> licenced under a GPL-compatible license.  If the symbol does not
> exist, the compiler exits [...]

Doesn't this restriction violate "right #0" of free software, the
right to use the software for any purpose?

Being in possession of a non-GPL'd plugin in no way violates the GPL,
even if one accepts arguendo that a plugin can't possibly written
except having to be "derived" from GPL sources.  That's because, as we
all should know, the GPL only kicks on when *distributing* that code.

(This same argument has come up in the context of the linux-kernel,
for ndiswrapper.  Each time, whenever people promote code some sort of
implicit license-violation guilt upon ndiswrapper, they have had to
back down because the GPL restrictions do not activate for mere use.)

- FChE