15 lines
1017 B
Plaintext
15 lines
1017 B
Plaintext
The GNU Autoconf Archive is a collection of more than 500 macros for GNU
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Autoconf that have been contributed as free software by friendly supporters of
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the cause from all over the Internet. Every single one of those macros can be
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re-used without imposing any restrictions whatsoever on the licensing of the
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generated configure script. In particular, it is possible to use all those
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macros in configure scripts that are meant for non-free software. This policy is
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unusual for a Free Software Foundation project. The FSF firmly believes that
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software ought to be free, and software licenses like the GPL are specifically
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designed to ensure that derivative work based on free software must be free as
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well. In case of Autoconf, however, an exception has been made, because Autoconf
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is at such a pivotal position in the software development tool chain that the
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benefits from having this tool available as widely as possible outweigh the
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disadvantage that some authors may choose to use it, too, for proprietary
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software.
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