Content-Type: text
Message-ID:  <199511162216.XAA20836@spock.iti.informatik.th-darmstadt.de>
Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
              <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
In-Reply-To:  <199511151659.LAA01214@aleph.bu.edu> from "Matthew Swift" at Nov
              15, 95 11:59:54 am
Date:         Thu, 16 Nov 1995 23:16:50 +0100
From: Joachim Schrod <schrod@ITI.INFORMATIK.TH-DARMSTADT.DE>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
              <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L
              <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
Subject:      Re: distribution conditions on packages and other LaTeX software
Status: R

> > As code written under GPL tries to embrace any code that integrates
> > it, i don't think i can even look at it

Sorry, but this is nonsense. Copyright works on the expression level,
not on the algorithm level.

> > let alone integrate any such
> > code into LaTeX -- which is unfortunate

If one _wants_ to integrate it, one can ask the author to release it
under a different copyright for integration. Actually, one will go a
step further and will probably demand a copyright waiver from the
author, to prevent coping with dozens of copyright holders.

Please note further that mere distribution (i.e., aggregation) does
not affect LaTeX. For this reason stand-alone packages may use GPLed
code without any affects on the LaTeX base distribution or on any
LaTeX turn-key distribution.

Cheers,
        Joachim

PS: How much code has been integrated until now, is that really a
problem? I had the impression that not much code from outsiders is
used (to say it politely... :-)

--
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Joachim Schrod                  Email: schrod@iti.informatik.th-darmstadt.de
Computer Science Department
Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany