Date: September 1, 2005
Author: Daniel Stenberg <daniel@haxx.se>
URL: http://curl.haxx.se/legal/distro-dilemma.html

Condition

 This document is written to describe the sitution as it is right now. libcurl
 7.14.0 is currently the latest version available. Things may (or perhaps
 will) of course change in the future.

 This document reflects my view and understanding of these things. Please tell
 me where and how you think I'm wrong, and I'll try to correct my mistakes.

Background 

 The Free Software Foundation has deemed the Original BSD license[1] to be
 "incompatible"[2] with GPL[3]. I'd rather say it is the other way around, but
 the point is the same: if you distribute a binary version of a GPL program,
 it MUST NOT be linked with any Original BSD-licenced parts or
 libraries. Doing so will violate the GPL license. For a long time, very many
 GPL licensed programs have avoided this license mess by adding an
 exception[8] to their license. And many others have just closed their eyes
 for this problem.

 libcurl is MIT-style[4] licensed - how on earth did this dilemma fall onto
 our plates?

 libcurl is only a little library. libcurl can be built to use OpenSSL for its
 SSL/TLS capabilities. OpenSSL is basically Original BSD licensed[5].

 If libcurl built to use OpenSSL is used by a GPL-licensed application and you
 decide to distribute a binary version of it (Linux distros - for example -
 tend to), you have a clash. GPL vs Original BSD.

 This dilemma is not libcurl-specific nor is it specific to any particular
 Linux distro.

Part of the Operating System

 This would not be a problem if the used lib would be considered part of the
 uderlying operating system, as then the GPL license has an exception
 clause[6] that allows applications to use such libs without having to be
 allowed to distribute it or its sources. Possibly some distros will claim
 that OpenSSL is part of their operating system.

 Debian does however not take this stance and has officially(?) claimed that
 OpenSSL is not a required part of the Debian operating system

Debian-legal

 In August 2004 I figured I should start pulling people's attention to this to
 see if anyone has any bright ideas or if they would dismiss my worries based
 on some elegant writing I had missed somewhere:

 My post to debian-legal on August 12 2004:

        http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2004/08/msg00279.html

 Several people agreed then that this is a known and rather big problem, but
 the following discussion didn't result in much.

GnuTLS

 With the release of libcurl 7.14.0 (May 2005), it can now get built to use
 GnuTLS instead of OpenSSL. GnuTLS is a LGPL[7] licensed library that offers a
 matching set of features as OpenSSL does. Now, you can build and distribute
 an SSL capable libcurl without including any Original BSD licensed code.

 I believe Debian is the first distro to provide libcurl/GnutTLS packages.

GnuTLS vs OpenSSL

 While these two libraries offer similar features, they are not equal. Both
 libraries have features the other one lacks. libcurl does not (yet) offer a
 standardized stable ABI if you decide to switch from using libcurl-openssl to
 libcurl-gnutls or vice versa. The GnuTLS support is very recent in libcurl
 and it has not been tested nor used very extensively, while the OpenSSL
 equivalent code has been used and thus matured for more than seven (7) years.

 In August 2005, the debian-devel mailing list discovered the license issue as
 a GPL licensed application wanted SSL capabilities from libcurl and thus was
 forced to use the GnuTLS powered libcurl. For a reason that is unknown to me,
 the application authors didn't want to or was unable to add an exception to
 their GPL license. Alas, the license problem hit the fan again.

The Better License, Original BSD or LGPL?

 It isn't obvious or without debate to any objective interested party that
 either of these licenses are the "better" or even the "preferred" one in a
 generic situation.

 Instead, I think we should accept the fact that the SSL/TLS libraries and
 their different licenses will fit different applications and their authors
 differently depending on the applications' licenses and their general usage
 pattern (considering how LGPL libraries can be burdonsome for embedded
 systems usage).

More SSL Libraries

 In libcurl, there's no stopping us here. There are at least a few more Open
 Source/Free SSL/TLS libraries and we would very much like to support them as
 well, to offer application authors an even wider scope of choice.

Application Angle of this Problem

 libcurl is built to use one SSL/TLS library. It uses a single fixed name (by
 default), and applications are built/linked to use that single lib. Replacing
 one libcurl instance with another one that uses the other SSL/TLS library
 might break one or more applications (due to ABI differences and/or different
 feature set). You want your application to use the libcurl it was built for.

Project cURL Angle of this Problem

 We distribute libcurl and everyone may build libcurl with either library. At
 their choice. This problem is not directly a problem of ours. It merely
 affects users - GPL application authors only - of our lib as it comes
 included and delivered on some distros.

Distro Angle of this Problem

 A distro can provide separate libcurls built with different SSL/TLS libraries
 to work around this, but at least Debian seems to be very hostile against
 such an approach, probably since it makes things like devel packages for the
 different libs collide since they would provide the same include files and
 man pages etc.

Fixing the Only Problem

 The only problem is thus for distributions that want to offer libcurl
 versions built with more than one SSL/TLS library.

 Since multiple libcurl binaries using different names are ruled out, we need
 to come up with a way to have one single libcurl that someone uses different
 underlying libraries. The best(?) approach currently suggested involves this:

 A new intermediate library (named lib2 so far in the discussions) with the
 single purpose of providing libcurl with SSL/TLS capabilities. It would have
 a unified API and ABI no matter what underlying library it would use.

 There would be one lib2 binary provided for each supported SSL/TLS library.
 For example: lib2-openssl, lib2-gnutls, lib2-yassl, lib2-matrixssl and
 lib2-nossl. Yes, take note of the last one that provides the lib2 ABI but
 that lacks the actual powers.

 When libcurl is built and linked, it will be linked against a lib2 with the
 set ABI.

 When you link an app against libcurl, it would also need to provide one of
 the (many) lib2 libs to decide what approach that fits the app. An app that
 doesn't want SSL at all would still need to link with the lib2-nossl lib.

 GPL apps can pick the lib2-gnutls, others may pick the lib2-openssl.

 This concept works equally well both for shared and static libraries.

 A positive side effect of this approach could be a more generic "de facto"
 standard API for SSL/TLS libraries.

When Will This Happen

 Note again that this is not a problem in curl, it doesn't solve any actual
 technical problems in our project. Don't hold your breath for this to happen
 very soon (if at all) unless you step forward and contribute.

 The suggestion that is outlined above is still only a suggestion. Feel free
 to bring a better idea!

 Also, to keep in mind: I don't want this new concept to have too much of an
 impact on the existing code. Preferably it should be possible to build the
 code like today (without the use of lib2), should you decide to ignore the
 problems outlined in this document.

Footnotes

 [1] = http://www.xfree86.org/3.3.6/COPYRIGHT2.html#6
 [2] = http://www.fsf.org/licensing/essays/bsd.html
 [3] = http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl.html
 [4] = http://curl.haxx.se/docs/copyright.html
 [5] = http://www.openssl.org/source/license.html
 [6] = http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl.html end of section 3
 [7] = http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/lgpl.html
 [8] = http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OpenSSL_exception

Feedback/Updates provided by

 Eric Cooper
