[DGD] AGPL and mudlibs under DGD 1.4

[Felix A. Croes]

<jimorie at gmail.com> wrote:

> In the light of recent events, I would like to ask what DGD's new
> license will entail for a MUD running under it, if anything.
>
> Reading up on GNU AGPL I understand that modifications to DGD 1.4 must
> be made available to all users of the server running the modified
> code. My immediate question then becomes whether it can be argued that
> the mudlib of a MUD running DGD 1.4 falls under this clause?

The mudlib is separate.  The running code of the objects is also
separate, just like the license of gcc does not affect the code it
compiles.  The statedumps are separate.  None of them are affected
by DGD's license.

There are border cases: writing your own kfuns using the extension
interface, or compiling LPC code to C.  In both cases, you are
linking with DGD, and I understand that the FSF takes the position
that this makes the AGPL apply to the linked code.  In both cases,
as far as I'm concerned you do not have to show me your source code
(am I supposed to read the LPC-to-C code?  Huh).  If it bothers you,
don't use those features.  Ask Bart for a project membership and
change the LPC-to-C compiler to remove few hints that are added to
the generated code, to make it totally obfuscated. :)  Perhaps there
are other solutions that put these bits of code at arm's length for
DGD, so all can agree that the AGPL does not apply.  DGD's source code
is all yours, start hacking.

I <do> want to see the changes that are made to DGD's source code.
I've put 19 years of my life in this, and now I want to see what people
are doing with it.

Regards,
Felix Croes