gpgme license

[marius aamodt eriksen]

* Werner Koch <wk at gnupg.org> [020816 03:50]:

> On Fri, 16 Aug 2002 00:18:58 -0400, marius aamodt eriksen said:
> 
> > i assume by hoarders, you mean people who use your software, what's
> > bad about people using your software?
>
> Please read the GNU manifesto to learn what we call hoarders:
> http://www.gnu.org/gnu/manifesto.html

the gpl doesn't understand that certain companies have no choice but
to integrate proprietary software - the reasons may be out of their
control, or something not having anything to do with software, or
computers at all!  in the end, i write free software so that people
can enjoy it and modify it all they want; i want people to use it.  in
my mind, if anyone makes modifications (for improvements) it is common
courtesy to give back the code *if their situationa allows for it.*
and that's what happens practically - people, and even companies, give
back code if they can.

> > again, as i stated before, this seems to be untrue; if it WAS true,
> > then why was ximian forced to use another solution when they needed
> > PGP integration in evolution?  they were not interesting in modifying
> 
> Becuase they wanted to support the proprietary PGP 7 and today it
> seems that they require the PGP support even for _their_ proprietary
> Exchange Connector.

a company has certain goals, if those goals involve supporting
something proprietary, i don't see anything wrong with using free
software to get there.  anyway, it comes down to something the GPL
won't allow.

> > gpgme, only in using it for a solution which could have commercial
> > extensions.  to me, this seems to be the exact same situation; no
> 
> You probably mean proprietary and not commercial?  There is nothing
> wrong to use or write commercial Free Software; the GPL explicitly
> allows this.

correct, sorry.

> > supports a number of pgp implementations as its backend (currently
> > PGP5, GnuPG in the works, PGP2 next).  honestly i believe the
> 
> I hope you don't support PGP 5.x - it has far too many bugs and nobody
> should even consider to use a PGP version >= 5 && < 6.5.8.

PGP5 is just one of the supported backends -- if you already do use
it, pgpwrap will use it also.  btw - i cannot find proof of any
serious bugs; most of the ones i can find are a result of incorrect
use; pgpwrap enforces correct usage.

> > of code.  gpgme seems to have overdone a few things, and libpgpwrap
> 
> GPGME is not just a wrapper around GnuPG but a general interface to
> certain crypto services (mainly email).

i am aware of that; but in the end, the functionality of pgpwrap and
gpgme is the same; who cares what goes on in the background?  pgpwrap
can provide nearly the same services gpgpme provides, and with further
expansion, all of them.  plus, if i decide to adopt tom zerucha's
openpgp implementation (and consequently improve it), pgpwrap will be
as independent as gnupg.

marius.

-- 
> marius at umich.edu > http://www.citi.umich.edu/u/marius