[tex-live] Ruby interpreter for Windows in the TeXLive distribution?

[Hans Hagen]

Sebastian Rahtz wrote:
> Hans Hagen wrote:
>>> "Under the GPL" implies that we'd also need to provide the
>>> corresponding source code or a written offer.
>>>       
>> so a pointer to source code would be enough, and maybe even:
>>
>> google for "ruby source code download"
>>   
> No. The considered legal view is that this
> is not sufficient to meet the terms of the licence.
> To comply with the GPL, we must offer to
> supply the source code to the recipient
> directly, for the exact version of Ruby which
> we supply.  A vague "go google for the source
> if you want" could have the FSF after us.
>
well, then we can put the tar.gz file with the sources alongside (i 
suppose that we don't have to explain in detail how one generates the 
binaries)

btw, an interesting side effect is that in addition to support on the 
derived work (the tex distribution) user groups may end up in providing 
all kind of support (offering sources, burdning additional cd's, hiring 
web servers to serve the sources, etc); i wonder if that's the real 
intention of gpl. Say that i have 1 meg of webspace and provide a ruby 
script, does that mean that i also need to provide the 10 meg of 
libraries that are used and even the source code of the binaries needed 
to run them ... quite impractical); i'd expect that nowadsys, with the 
availability of networks references to locations would be enough; i 
wonder if such things will evolve to more practical ones some day

Hans


 

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