Re: patent on O_ATOMICLOOKUP [Re: [PATCH] loopable tmpfs (2.4.17)]

David Woodhouse (dwmw2@infradead.org)
Sun, 26 May 2002 11:11:38 +0100

lm@bitmover.com said:
> On Sat, May 25, 2002 at 05:22:43PM -0400, Albert D. Cahalan wrote:
> > To get a free patent license, EVERYTHING must be GPL.
> > Not just the real-time part! So that would be:
> >
> > 1. the RT microkernel (OK)
> > 2. the RT "app" (OK)
> > 3. Linux itself (OK)
> > 4. normal Linux apps (ouch!)

> Whether that is true or not I don't know. But I do know that if all
> the stuff was GPLed, then you are safe no matter what, right?

It's been asserted that the patent licence requires that _all_ userspace
apps running on the system by GPL'd. Yet there are many Free Software
applications in a standard Linux distribution that are under
GPL-incompatible licences. Apache, xinetd, etc...

If that interpretation is true, it _would_ be a problem, and not just for
those trying to make money from it.

--
dwmw2




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