Re: Is there a reason why GNUnet forcefully sends a message of type 6?

[Christian Grothoff]

On 5/23/20 2:38 PM, Alessio Vanni wrote:
> Christian Grothoff <address@hidden> writes:
> 
>> Actually, no. Type 6 implements our *Affero* GPL mechanism to provide
>> anyone who accesses *any* GNUnet service with the means to download the
>> source code. GNUnet is released under the AGPL, which specifically
>> states that such a mechanism to obtain the source must not be disabled.
>>
>> So a third-party application would be in violation of the AGPL license
>> if it disabled this particular handler. Basically, that's the one
>> "freedom" the *Affero* GPL takes away: the freedom to remove or disable
>> a "download source" mechanism.
> 
> I'm not sure I understood: you are saying that third-party application
> must proved a mechanism to ask for GNUnet's AGPL URL even if the
> application itself is not licensed under the AGPL or is part of GNUnet
> core?  I'm not an expert of that license so I don't know what it means
> to use it or interfacing with a library (even just libgnunetutil)
> licensed under the AGPL.

If you are linking against GNUnet libraries, you fall under the AGPL.
It does not matter whether you are in our repository.

>> Finally, in general we'll want even third-party applications to use
>> message types that are "registered" globally. We recently setup
>> https://gana.gnunet.org/ which will be used to facilitate this.
> 
> Again, I'm missing something: are applications required to register a
> global message type even though the service doesn't communicate over the
> network?

Not required, my goal is to make it easier for third-party applications
to reserve protocol numbers. And so far we make them globally unique to
facilitate debugging/logging/understanding, even if global uniqueness is
technically not required.

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