GNU Lesser General Public License ETERNUS CS800 2.3.1 Open-Source Source Codes
604 U41840-J-Z125-7-76
criteria of freedom. The Lesser General Public License permits more lax
criteria for linking other code with the library.
We call this license the “Lesser” General Public License because it does Less
to protect the user's freedom than the ordinary General Public License. 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. For example, permission to use the GNU C Library
in non-free programs enables many more people to use the whole GNU operating
system, as well as its variant, the GNU/Linux operating system.
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.
GNU LESSER GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
0. 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”.
A “library” means a collection of software functions and/or data prepared so
as to be conveniently linked with application programs (which use some of
those functions and data) to form executables.
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