Devel Digest, Vol 7, Issue 38

[Luke Schierer]

On Wed, Oct 17, 2007 at 09:36:03PM +0200, Sascha Vogt wrote:
> Hi Ethan, hi all!
> 
> First: I'm totally pro OSS and
> Second: I do not use Skype, so that doesn't affect me personally.
> 
> Ethan Blanton schrieb:
> > Eion Robb spake unto us the following wisdom:
> >> I'm not sure if you (or most people on the devel list) understand how
> >> the connection is made between the client (eg my plugin) using the API
> >> and Skype. The Skype 'API' isn't a traditional API or library or
> >> anything to link to, its just a protocol with a different name. For
> >> example, sending "NAME Pidgin" over an x11/win32 message, tells Skype
> >> that there's a program with the name 'Pidgin' connecting to it.  No
> >> linking of libraries or nothing.
> > 
> > I understand that the Skype API uses D-Bus or X11 as an RPC mechanism.
> > I find that irrelevant.  This is nothing more than a craven attempt to
> > circumvent the GPL.  I'm not sure *you* understand the implications
> > here.
> 
> Let me ask one question: If the Skype API would be using a local daemon
> to which someone could connect via TCP. Would it then be OK? Because
> until now I thought D-Bus is in some way not more than a way how
> different processes can communicate. I never thought of it as RPC
> mechanism (of course you can use it as such, but thats not different
> from sending XML messages -> WebServices).
> 
> You send a "message" to another process. IMHO it doesn't matter a) where
> the process is located (local or remote) and b) what sort of message
> this is (a standardized object, a XML message, ...). But of course this
> depends a little on the view on it and I think if you're gonna ask two
> lawyers you'll get at least three opinions on that :)
> 
> Greetings
> -Sascha-

The problem, as I see it, is not that you have a gpl'ed process talking
to a non-gpl'ed process, but that you are distributing both together to
form a single whole.

This is not a client<->server model, but a "let me pass this over dbus
to do that part of the work because I can't link against it."

If these were *actually* separate, there's be no problem.  As it stands,
this is the sort of gpl-evasion stuff that the license forsees and
attempts to ward off.

As a Pidgin developer I do not like, nor will I support, such a blatent
attempt to avoid our gpl.

luke