Windoze question

Andrew Marlow apm35 at student.open.ac.uk
Thu Oct 25 18:37:01 CEST 2001


I think this has hightlighted an important point about the GPG web site.
It is not immediately obvious (to me, anyway) from the web site that GPG
is covered by the GPL. 
Those in the know will presume it is, since it is a GNU project. But here
we have someone asking about open source. 
IMO GNU projects make an important distinction between open source and
free software. I believe that GPG is in the latter category.
This means that GPG is software that has freedom and the license says that
in order for you to enjoy this freedom you must not take it away from
others.

Some GPL'd source comes with libraries that are LGPL'd. The LGPL allows
the library to be used in the development of closed-source proprietary
software. Whether you use PGP or GPG you need to check these things out.
Just having the source code available is not enough.

License permitting, I would recommend GPG over PGP since I think GPG has a
closer eye on the RFC and other issues, such as crypto-law and patent law.
GPG has also taken some decisions which have made it less vunerable to
certain problems (e.g the ADK issue).

-apm






More information about the Gnupg-devel mailing list