da Silva, Joe wrote:

I have now tried WDOSX 0.96 and it works with the GPC "Hello world" test program! Not only did it convert the executable to a stand-alone application (built-in DPMI services), it also compressed the executable to nearly half it's original size! :-)

Nice, but maybe it only stripped the symbol table (like `strip' does).

OK, one final newbie question : The online documentation (http://agnes.dida.physik.uni-essen.de/~gnu-pascal/gnu.html) says that GPC can be used to compile "commercial, non-free" applications. Is this a modification of the standard GNU GPL, or is this an interpretation of the GPL?

It's a special exception. All files of the Run Time System contain a license statement like the following:

: This file is part of GNU Pascal. : : GNU Pascal is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify : it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by : the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) : any later version. : : GNU Pascal is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, : but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of : MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the : GNU General Public License for more details. : : You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License : along with GNU Pascal; see the file COPYING. If not, write to the : Free Software Foundation, 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA : 02111-1307, USA. : : As a special exception, if you link this file with files compiled : with a GNU compiler to produce an executable, this does not cause : the resulting executable to be covered by the GNU General Public : License. This exception does not however invalidate any other : reasons why the executable file might be covered by the GNU General : Public License.

The compiler itself does not contain the exception, but that's not necessary, because the output of a GPL's program does not automatically fall under the GPL (unless it does for other reasons). So, only if you copy/link some actual code from the compiler's sources in your program, it would have to be GPL'd.

Please note that some units distributed with GPC, or contributed on other places have different licences, so check the license of each unit you use (but that applies to any compiler, of course).

The reason I ask, is that a number of people, including (I think) DJ Delorie (of DJGPP fame), have a different interpretation. I apologise if this question has been asked before, but no matter how many times I read the GPL or look at the information of the FSF and GNU, I just can't figure it out.

AFAIK, the DJGPP library is released under the LGPL which does allow linking to non-free programs, though under some conditions (e.g., provide relinkable object files, but see the LGPL for the exact details). Of course, as above, this does not apply for using the code of GCC or any other GPL'd program ported to DJGPP.

Frank