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Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software patents. We wish to avoid the danger that companies distributing free software will individually
obtain patent licenses, thus in effect transforming the program into proprietary software. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any patent must be
licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.

 

Most GNU software, including some libraries, is covered by the ordinary GNU General Public License, which was designed for utility programs. This license, the
GNU Library General Public License, applies to certain designated libraries. This license is quite different from the ordinary one; be sure to read it in full, and
don't assume that anything in it is the same as in the ordinary license.

 

The reason we have a separate public license for some libraries is that they blur the distinction we usually make between modifying or adding to a program
and simply using it. Linking a program with a library, without changing the library, is in some sense simply using the library, and is analogous to running a
utility program or application program. However, in a textual and legal sense, the linked executable is a combined work, a derivative of the original library, and
the ordinary General Public License treats it as such.

 

Because of this blurred distinction, using the ordinary General Public License for libraries did not effectively promote software sharing, because most
developers did not use the libraries. We concluded that weaker conditions might promote sharing better.

 

However, unrestricted linking of non-free programs would deprive the users of those programs of all benefit from the free status of the libraries themselves.
This Library General Public License is intended to permit developers of non-free programs to use free libraries, while preserving your freedom as a user of such
programs to change the free libraries that are incorporated in them. (We have not seen how to achieve this as regards changes in header files, but we have
achieved it as regards changes in the actual functions of the Library.) The hope is that this will lead to faster development of free libraries.

 

The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and modification follow. Pay close attention to the difference between a "work based on the library"
and a "work that uses the library". The former contains code derived from the library, while the latter only works together with the library. Note that it is
possible for a library to be covered by the ordinary General Public License rather than by this special one.

GNU LIBRARY GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE

TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION

 

This License Agreement applies to any software library which contains a notice placed by the copyright holder or other authorized party saying it may be
distributed under the terms of this Library General Public License (also called "this License"). Each licensee is addressed as "you".

 

A "library" means a collection of software functions and/or data prepared so as to be conveniently linked with application programs (which use some of those
functions and data) to form executables.

 

The "Library", below, refers to any such software library or work which has been distributed under these terms. A "work based on the Library" means either
the Library or any derivative work under copyright law: that is to say, a work containing the Library or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications
and/or translated straightforwardly into another language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in the term "modification".)

 

"Source code" for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For a library, complete source code means all the source code for
all modules it contains, plus any associated interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the library.

 

Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running a program using the
Library is not restricted, and output from such a program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Library (independent of the use of the
Library in a tool for writing it). Whether that is true depends on what the Library does and what the program that uses the Library does.

1.

You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Library's complete source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you conspicuously
and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the notices that refer to this License
and to the absence of any warranty; and distribute a copy of this License along with the Library.

You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.

2.

You may modify your copy or copies of the Library or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Library, and copy and distribute such
modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

a.

 

The modified work must itself be a software library.

b.

 

You must cause the files modified to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.

c.

 

You must cause the whole of the work to be licensed at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.

d.

 

If a facility in the modified Library refers to a function or a table of data to be supplied by an application program that uses the facility, other than

as an argument passed when the facility is invoked, then you must make a good faith effort to ensure that, in the event an application does not
supply such function or table, the facility still operates, and performs whatever part of its purpose remains meaningful.

(For example, a function in a library to compute square roots has a purpose that is entirely well-defined independent of the application. Therefore,
Subsection 2d requires that any application-supplied function or table used by this function must be optional: if the application does not supply it,
the square root function must still compute square roots.)

These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Library, and can be reasonably

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