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Position on the article 3a of the GNU General Public License

Submitted by mchauvet on 27 March, 2009 - 17:20
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Some companies distribute software under the GNU [3] General Public License and provide their source code with binary programs. The April recalls that this process respects the GPL [4], the first of three modes of distribution of source code being held: "accompany it [the program] with the complete corresponding machine-readable source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above, on a medium customarily used for software interchange". A software distributed in this manner is therefore free software [5].

April also recalls that the GPL [6] requires making the source code available to users, which is different from an obligation to publish the source code.
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[7] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.fr.html