Gnu library or lesser general public license lgpl

It provides less of a standard for source code analysis, but there are still requirements for transparency and attribution.

For example, some industry insiders differ over the specific requirements attached to LGPL licenses, and in what ways users can put open-source projects into their own applications. Many experts recommend using an attorney to review an LGPL before including free software elements as part of a proprietary product.

The wording of a license can make a difference in how it can be used, and some general characterizations fail to provide a full understanding of what an LGPL license allows and covers. By: Brad Rudisail Contributor. By: Kaushik Pal Contributor. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the source code.

If you link other code with the library, you must provide complete object files to the recipients, so that they can relink them with the library after making changes to the library and recompiling it. And you must show them these terms so they know their rights. To protect each distributor, we want to make it very clear that there is no warranty for the free library.

Also, if the library is modified by someone else and passed on, the recipients should know that what they have is not the original version, so that the original author's reputation will not be affected by problems that might be introduced by others. Finally, software patents pose a constant threat to the existence of any free program. We wish to make sure that a company cannot effectively restrict the users of a free program by obtaining a restrictive license from a patent holder.

Therefore, we insist that any patent license obtained for a version of the library must be consistent with the full freedom of use specified in this license. We use this license for certain libraries in order to permit linking those libraries into non-free programs.

When a program is linked with a library, whether statically or using a shared library, the combination of the two is legally speaking a combined work, a derivative of the original library.

The ordinary General Public License therefore permits such linking only if the entire combination fits its criteria of freedom. The Lesser General Public License permits more lax criteria for linking other code with the library. It also provides other free software developers Less of an advantage over competing non-free programs. These disadvantages are the reason we use the ordinary General Public License for many libraries.

However, the Lesser license provides advantages in certain special circumstances. For example, on rare occasions, there may be a special need to encourage the widest possible use of a certain library, so that it becomes a de-facto standard. To achieve this, non-free programs must be allowed to use the library. A more frequent case is that a free library does the same job as widely used non-free libraries. In this case, there is little to gain by limiting the free library to free software only, so we use the Lesser General Public License.

In other cases, permission to use a particular library in non-free programs enables a greater number of people to use a large body of free software.

Although the Lesser General Public License is Less protective of the users' freedom, it does ensure that the user of a program that is linked with the Library has the freedom and the wherewithal to run that program using a modified version of the Library.

The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and modification follow. Pay close attention to the difference between a "work based on the library" and a "work that uses the library". The former contains code derived from the library, whereas the latter must be combined with the library in order to run. This License Agreement applies to any software library or other program which contains a notice placed by the copyright holder or other authorized party saying it may be distributed under the terms of this Lesser General Public License also called "this License".

Each licensee is addressed as "you". The "Library", below, refers to any such software library or work which has been distributed under these terms. Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in the term "modification". For a library, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the library.

Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. After all, there are plenty of other C libraries; using the GPL for ours would have driven proprietary software developers to use another—no problem for them, only for us. However, when a library provides a significant unique capability, like GNU Readline, that's a horse of a different color. The Readline library implements input editing and history for interactive programs, and that's a facility not generally available elsewhere.

Releasing it under the GPL and limiting its use to free programs gives our community a real boost. At least one application program is free software today specifically because that was necessary for using Readline.

If we amass a collection of powerful GPL-covered libraries that have no parallel available to proprietary software, they will provide a range of useful modules to serve as building blocks in new free programs. This will be a significant advantage for further free software development, and some projects will decide to make software free in order to use these libraries. University projects can easily be influenced; nowadays, as companies begin to consider making software free, even some commercial projects can be influenced in this way.

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed. Defining a subclass of a class defined by the Library is deemed a mode of using an interface provided by the Library. If you modify a copy of the Library, and, in your modifications, a facility refers to a function or data to be supplied by an Application that uses the facility other than as an argument passed when the facility is invoked , then you may convey a copy of the modified version:.

The object code form of an Application may incorporate material from a header file that is part of the Library. You may convey such object code under terms of your choice, provided that, if the incorporated material is not limited to numerical parameters, data structure layouts and accessors, or small macros, inline functions and templates ten or fewer lines in length , you do both of the following:. You may convey a Combined Work under terms of your choice that, taken together, effectively do not restrict modification of the portions of the Library contained in the Combined Work and reverse engineering for debugging such modifications, if you also do each of the following:.