[techtalk] KDE / OpenSource

[Fan, Laurel]

Caitlyn M. Martin, caitlyn at netferrets.net, said:
> Thank you for the clarification.  The fact is, the KDE people and
TrollTech 
> both say it's fine to distribute it.  Maybe they need to fine-tune their 
> license, but really, it's their call what to do with their 
> product, isn't it?

Maybe so.  But another issue is that KDE has incorporated a lot of
non-KDE-written GPL'd code, without asking the authors if it was ok
to link their code with Qt.  In essence, forcing their controversial
interpretation of the GPL on other peoples' "products".

If all of KDE was written by KDE, it would be a fairly simple matter
to end the entire argument by licensing it under a "GPL, but you
can also link with QPL stuff"-type license.  Unfortunately, tracking
down the authors of every piece of code in KDE would be a lot of work.