Re: Pascal (and C) Compilers

On Wed, 6 Nov 2002, Aitor Santamaria Merino wrote:

> Reference compiler is BorlandC3, but some people tries to make software 
> compatible with BC2, BC++1 or WatcomC, all of them being "gratis" but 
> non-free.

OpenWatcom C is almost free speech, except for 
(a) if you deploy modified versions for any use other than personal or r&d
    use you must publish the source code of your modifications (the GPL 
    only requires you to do that if you distribute your modifications)
(b) redistribution must preferrably be done using "click-wrap".

(a) is acceptable to the OSI (Open Source Initiative) but not to the FSF.
The proposed OW license under which www.openwatcom.org now distributes 
source code is essentially the APSL + (b) - "Apple/Sybase has more rights 
over modifications than you" which is treated here:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/apsl.html
(b) is the thing that is stalling acceptance by OSI -- they're not sure if 
it's reasonable -- the users think it's not by the lawyers think it is ...

That is certainly a lot more free (as in speech) than the 
non-redistributable and no-source-code-available Borland compilers but 
just isn't Free in the FSF sense.

Bart