Matthias Fischmann wrote:
And it's really not as easy to control as you suggest: If you ever take in a single patch under the GPL,
This kind of thing doesn't happen by accident. Patches don't magically creep into your code, you have to apply them deliberately and you should always know whether you are allowed to do so. Applying a BSD-licensed patch and neglecting to mention the author may get you into exactly as much trouble.
or even implement a new feature in an obvious way that has been implemented by somebody else under the GPL, you are in trouble.
Bullshit again, for the GPL applies to code, not to ideas. Unless you believe that copyright law does indeed apply to ideas, *and* that a GPL-developer will come after you for reimplementing (not copying) his work, you have nothing to fear unless you outright steal code. May I humbly suggest some reading, like the text of the GPL itself and then something basic about copyright law?
AFAIR this happened to SSH.com with the bigint code in ssh-v1.3
SSH included GMP, which was licensed under the GPL. Nothing "happened" there, only the OpenSSH folks disliked the license and reimplemented GMP. Udo. -- "The imagination of nature is far, far greater than the imagination of man." -- Richard Feynman