Talk:GNAT Modified General Public License

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New name: License of GNU Ada

I am not quite happy with the new name. All Ada programmers know the Licence under the name of "Modified GPL" and the shortcut "MGPL". This is because - just like the Linux kernel - GNAT has a build in Licence check via the pragma License command.

So while your naming is prehaps politicly correct - it's what the user will type into the search box.

Also, not all of Ada is MGPL - i.E. packages derived from ISO 8652 are "unrestriced".

I'm totally agree, this license always has been refered to as Modified GPL (MGPL) or GNAT Modified GPL (GMGPL) [1] [2] [3]. This new name for the article, License of GNU Ada, is not appropiate. I propose to make this one a redirection to the old article name Modified GNU General Public License. We could even delete it, because Wikipedia isn't a search engine, although I'm more inclined to make it a redirect page (redirections are cheap [4], do not introduce much overhead to the servers). --suruena 10:00, 2005 Mar 12 (UTC)

There are zillions of other versions of the GPL modified by exceptions -- why shouldn't one of them be called the "Modified GPL"? What about "Ada Modified GPL"? For now, changing it to something at least unambiguous if not super-common.

Maybe simply "GNAT Modified GPL" --suruena 12:38, 2005 Apr 11 (UTC)

GPL not GGPL

Since it is the GNU General Public License MGPL would expand to GNU Modified General Public License.

--Krischik 17:00, 12 Mar 2005 (UTC)

No, GMGPL has always expanded to GNAT Modified General Public License. —optikos (talk) 06:39, 4 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Changing the name again

There's no article for the license of GNU Guile. GNU Guile, like GNAT and Ada, uses a version of the GPL with modifications which weaken its copyleft characteristics. There may also be other projects with similar licenses. So instead of starting a new article for the license of Guile, I propose generalising this article to discuss the category of GPLs which are used for Guile, GNAT, Ada, and possibly one or two more that I'm not aware of right now. I don't have a specific name in mind for the article, "Modified GPLs" is one option, although that would encompass the Affero General Public License (but, hey, maybe that would be a good idea). Comments much appreciated. Gronky 13:48, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Putting them all into one article might not be a bad idea. There's little to say about each one individually and many aren't even particularly important. Just my 2c. --kingboyk 18:46, 30 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Motivation

What was the motivation for this license? --Abdull (talk) 21:16, 26 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

The compilation of generic units in the Ada standard library produces derivative works of the standard library which are then to be linked into executables that perhaps have a license that is incompatible with the GPL. Just as with the LGPL for the C standard library, FSF does not seek to limit the usage of any of the GCC compilers to only producing libraries or executables that are GPL-compatibly licensed. But this party-line explanation is not complete. Two questions are begged (and we do beg for answers to them, because it seems that at least one of them should be logically/legally problematic)
- Why was the LGPL not sufficient for GCC Ada?
- Why is the LGPL sufficient for instantiating templates from the GCC C++ standard library to link with an executable whose license is incompatible with the GPL?

If Ada and Guile need a relaxation of GPL's copyleft that LGPL cannot provide, then why doesn't C++ need a substantially-similar relaxation of copyleft that LGPL cannot provide? —optikos (talk) 06:37, 4 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]