[fpc-pascal] LGPL rtl

[noreply at z505.com]

I think all freepascal people have a misunderstanding of LGPL.

If you statically link the lgpl code into your EXE, your exe is the module
under lgpl now. Therefore all code must be released. Statically linked
lgpl code in an exe is not a dll that can be shipped separately.

This means currently all freepascal developers are violating the license
if they don't release their sources with their Exe that is statically
linked with lgpl sources.

The way to get around this is to ship object files with your application
so that you can relink the application.

Since freepascal and delphi is very "ship one exe" oriented (compile all
into single exe) and since dll's aren't used to ship the RTL, this means
freepascal developers all around the world are currently violating the
lgpl since the Exe you ship to people is a lgpl module, not your own
module under your own license.

I personally couldn't care less if you ship your exe without your source
code... but I think freepascal users and developers have grossly
misinterpreted what legally the LGPL actually means.

If you read up on it on the internet you will see that the work around is
to ship your RTL in a separate dll, or ship it as object files along with
object files that your application needs to be recompiled. This is a huge
inconvenience for developers IMO and is why LGPL/GPL is even more
obnoxious than the so called bsd advertising clause problem.