Re: psql & readline & win32

"Andrew Dunstan" <andrew(at)dunslane(dot)net> writes:
> The readline home page at
> http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/readline/rltop.html says:
> Readline is free software, distributed under the terms of the GNU General
> Public License, version 2. This means that if you want to use Readline in a
> program that you release or distribute to anyone, the program must be free
> software and have a GPL-compatible license.

> Our BSD license is recognised as a GPL-compatible license.

Whoever wrote that doesn't seem to have bothered to read the GPL. The
language of the GPL is exceedingly clear and specific:

b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
parties under the terms of this License.

It says THIS LICENSE. There is nothing at all about "compatible
licenses" anywhere in the document. (Quote taken directly from the copy
of the GPL in readline-4.2a.tar.gz.)

> I really don't see that the Windows binary installer is any different from
> the binary installers that most Linux distros have, and they are all linked
> with readline.

... and they are all GPL-licensed.

The fundamental problem here is that we don't want the Windows
distribution of PG to become effectively GPL-licensed. There's no
issue if someone builds their own copy and doesn't redistribute it,
but there is a big issue if we are distributing a heavily used port
in a way that violates someone else's license.

regards, tom lane