Am 26. May, 2007 schwätzte Tuna so:
> Apparently the Army's Land Warrior system runs Linux.
>
> http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/military_law/4215725.html
Interesting. Where can we buy those displays?
> But here's my question: Where's the code? Don't they have to release the
> source code if it's open source?
If it's your code under the GPL and you don't release the binary to anyone
you don't have to provide the source.
The government isn't allowed to own copyright, so most likely the software
is provided by companies. If they're providing it under the GPL they
only need to offer to provide the source code to those who've gotten the
binary products. In other words, they can offer the source code to the
government, but don't have to offer it to anyone who isn't buying these
units.
The government isn't under obligation to release the source code. If you
thought for more than 2 seconds about the possibility of this government
releasing military info it doesn't need to release you wasted your time.
The source code doesn't necessarily have to be GPL (I didn't read the
whole article, so maybe I missed something saying the application code is
GPL), so it might be proprietary.
The GPL only affects modifications to GPL code bases or code that depends
on GPL code. Generally, if you interface with the GPL code via and API
you're not subject to the GPL. The Affero modification to the GPL covers
this case, but the GNU GPL does not.
If you're including a library that's under the GPL you'd be subject to the
GPL. The easy way to avoid that is to write your own library and not use
one that's been GPLd.
ciao,
der.hans
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