Apple, iPhone, and GPLv3 troubles

[Chris Lattner]

On Sep 24, 2008, at 12:57 PM, Ian Lance Taylor wrote:

> Chris Lattner <clattner@apple.com> writes:
>
>> My personal feeling on the matter is that it seems very strange to
>> talk about *compiler plugins* in the license for *runtime libraries*.
>> Considering that there are already widely available alternative
>> libraries (e.g. the apache stdc++ library and many others) it seems
>> potentially damaging to the GCC community to try to address the  
>> plugin
>> issue this way.
>
> Here's the problem: the FSF doesn't really want to permit plugins.

> So, how do we permit plugins while prohibiting proprietary plugins,
> and how do we do it while staying within the bounds of copyright law
> which is the basis of the GPL?

Does the obvious answer work?: add it to the license that covers the  
code in question.  Specifically, I think that it would be much more  
reasonable to add "plugin" wording to the license that covers the GCC  
compiler code itself.  This means that you couldn't use *GCC* if you  
did something the FSF found objectionable, closing an easy work-around.

-Chris