Re: configure not happy with OpenBSD2.3

[Jeffrey A Law <law at cygnus dot com>]

  In message <35B0D944.655CCA02@gte.net>you write:
  > Why is it that egcs supports many proprietary platforms that
  > provide no source code nor do they assign rights to the FSF
It has nothing to do with the openness of the platform, but rather
whether or not someone writes support for that platform and contributes
that support to the FSF.

For example, HPUX is a proprietary system.   I wrote support in the
compiler, assembler, debugger, etc to support that system.  When I wrote
that code, I assigned my changes to GCC, GDB, GAS, etc to the FSF.  So the
FSF owns the GCC, GDB, GAS code I wrote to support that system.

The same needs to happen for OpenBSD.  Note that the files OpenBSD currently
provides with their system do not have clear authorship, and thus getting
assignments for them is almost impossible (since the original author would
need to assign the changes to the FSF.).

I would happily include OpenBSD support if we get a contribution with
proper legal paperwork which assigns the changes to the FSF.

--


The assignments are necessary to keep the FSF as the clear and undisputed
owner of the code.

Having the FSF as the clear and undisputed onwer of the code prevents
individuals and companies from undermining the free nature of GCC and
other FSF tools.  And as the sole owner of the code, only FSF must take
action when someone violates the terms of the GPL.


jeff