I would encourage you to read the GNU Public License Wikipedia page (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnu_public_license).
Some relevant excerpts from the "GNU Public License" Wikipedia page:
Because a GPL work is copyrighted, a licensee has no right to redistribute it, not even in modified form (barring
fair use),
except under the terms of the license. One is only required to adhere
to the terms of the GPL if one wishes to exercise rights normally
restricted by copyright law, such as redistribution. Conversely, if one
distributes copies of the work without abiding by the terms of the GPL
(for instance, by keeping the source code secret), he or she can be
sued by the original author under copyright law.
And also this, from the same page:
A key dispute related to the GPL is whether or not non-GPL software can
dynamically link to GPL libraries. The GPL is clear in requiring that all
derivative works
of GPL'ed code must themselves be GPL'ed. However, it is not clear
whether an executable that dynamically links to a GPL code should be
considered a derivative work. The free/open-source software community
is split on this issue. The FSF asserts that such an executable is
indeed a derivative work if the executable and GPL code "make function
calls to each other and share data structures,"
[26] with others agreeing,
[27] while some (e.g.
Linus Torvalds) agree that dynamic linking can create derived works but disagree over the circumstances.
[28] On the other hand, some experts have argued that the question is still open: one
Novell lawyer has written that dynamic linking not being derivative "makes sense" but is not "clear-cut,"
[29] and
Lawrence Rosen
has claimed that a court of law would "probably" exclude dynamic
linking from derivative works although "there are also good arguments"
on the other side and "the outcome is not clear"
[30] (on a later occasion, he argued that "market-based" factors are more important than the linking technique
[31]). This is ultimately a question not of the GPL
per se, but of how copyright law defines derivative works. In
Galoob v. Nintendo the
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals
defined a derivative work as having "'form' or permanence" and noted
that "the infringing work must incorporate a portion of the copyrighted
work in some form," but there have been no clear court decisions to
resolve this particular conflict.
So it depends on whether your algorithm is a derived work, or original work (and it's likely to be considered a derivative work if you're using GNU Octave functions, written by people who were donating their time).
Not only that, but (as expressed by Thomas) even if you were charging money for .m files without risking getting sued by the FSF (or whoever happens to hold the copyright on the software), it would go against the entire philosophy of GNU Octave. I think you should
strongly reconsider your decision to attempt to "hide" your .m files. If the algorithm is so critical, I would suggest you either write your own executable (not using GNU libraries, of course, or you'll run into the same intellectual property issues) or find an Octave alternative released under the BSD or MIT licenses (as those are "more free" and do not require derivative works to be released under the same license) to eliminate any risks you would be running.
Charles
==========
Out of damp and gloomy days, out of solitude, out of loveless words directed at us, conclusions grow up in us like fungus: one morning they are there, we know not how, and they gaze upon us, morose and gray. Woe to the thinker who is not the gardener but only the soil of the plants that grow in him.
- Friedrich Nietzsche
On Thu, Sep 25, 2008 at 12:55 PM, Oscar Bayona Candel
<address@hidden> wrote:
Hi all two questions:
Fisrt, in the next two or three years I want to create my own company.
I want,if it is possible, to use octave as a one of my programming languagues, the other is Ox.
My first question is, how much it will cost?it is possible to use it freely?
Second, if I want to protect a code (an m file) (temporaly) how can I make it in octave?That is I want that my programm will be used freely but not the way I have programmed.
Thanks in advance and best regards¡¡
¡Haz tu clic solidario y ayuda a África!
¡Puedes empezar ahora!
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