1 [I have snipped the snail mail address of the FSF because it has
2 changed in the past and is likely to change again. The current
3 address should be at http://www.gnu.org/]
5 GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
6 Version 1, February 1989
8 Copyright (C) 1989 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
9 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
10 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
14 The license agreements of most software companies try to keep users
15 at the mercy of those companies. By contrast, our General Public
16 License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free
17 software--to make sure the software is free for all its users. The
18 General Public License applies to the Free Software Foundation's
19 software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it.
20 You can use it for your programs, too.
22 When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
23 price. Specifically, the General Public License is designed to make
24 sure that you have the freedom to give away or sell copies of free
25 software, that you receive source code or can get it if you want it,
26 that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free
27 programs; and that you know you can do these things.
29 To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
30 anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights.
31 These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you
32 distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
34 For example, if you distribute copies of a such a program, whether
35 gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that
36 you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the
37 source code. And you must tell them their rights.
39 We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and
40 (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy,
41 distribute and/or modify the software.
43 Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain
44 that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free
45 software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we
46 want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so
47 that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original
50 The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
53 GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
54 TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
56 0. This License Agreement applies to any program or other work which
57 contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be
58 distributed under the terms of this General Public License. The
59 "Program", below, refers to any such program or work, and a "work based
60 on the Program" means either the Program or any work containing the
61 Program or a portion of it, either verbatim or with modifications. Each
62 licensee is addressed as "you".
64 1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's source
65 code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you conspicuously and
66 appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and
67 disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the notices that refer to this
68 General Public License and to the absence of any warranty; and give any
69 other recipients of the Program a copy of this General Public License
70 along with the Program. You may charge a fee for the physical act of
73 2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of
74 it, and copy and distribute such modifications under the terms of Paragraph
75 1 above, provided that you also do the following:
77 a) cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that
78 you changed the files and the date of any change; and
80 b) cause the whole of any work that you distribute or publish, that
81 in whole or in part contains the Program or any part thereof, either
82 with or without modifications, to be licensed at no charge to all
83 third parties under the terms of this General Public License (except
84 that you may choose to grant warranty protection to some or all
85 third parties, at your option).
87 c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when
88 run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use
89 in the simplest and most usual way, to print or display an
90 announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice
91 that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a
92 warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these
93 conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this General
96 d) You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a
97 copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in
100 Mere aggregation of another independent work with the Program (or its
101 derivative) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring
102 the other work under the scope of these terms.
104 3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a portion or derivative of
105 it, under Paragraph 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
106 Paragraphs 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
108 a) accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
109 source code, which must be distributed under the terms of
110 Paragraphs 1 and 2 above; or,
112 b) accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
113 years, to give any third party free (except for a nominal charge
114 for the cost of distribution) a complete machine-readable copy of the
115 corresponding source code, to be distributed under the terms of
116 Paragraphs 1 and 2 above; or,
118 c) accompany it with the information you received as to where the
119 corresponding source code may be obtained. (This alternative is
120 allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you
121 received the program in object code or executable form alone.)
123 Source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making
124 modifications to it. For an executable file, complete source code means
125 all the source code for all modules it contains; but, as a special
126 exception, it need not include source code for modules which are standard
127 libraries that accompany the operating system on which the executable
128 file runs, or for standard header files or definitions files that
129 accompany that operating system.
131 4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, distribute or transfer the
132 Program except as expressly provided under this General Public License.
133 Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense, distribute or transfer
134 the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights to use
135 the Program under this License. However, parties who have received
136 copies, or rights to use copies, from you under this General Public
137 License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties
138 remain in full compliance.
140 5. By copying, distributing or modifying the Program (or any work based
141 on the Program) you indicate your acceptance of this license to do so,
142 and all its terms and conditions.
144 6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
145 Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original
146 licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to these
147 terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the
148 recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
150 7. The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
151 of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
152 be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
153 address new problems or concerns.
155 Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
156 specifies a version number of the license which applies to it and "any
157 later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions
158 either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
159 Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
160 the license, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
163 8. If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free
164 programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author
165 to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free
166 Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes
167 make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals
168 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
169 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
173 9. BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
174 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN
175 OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES
176 PROVIDE THE PROGRAM "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED
177 OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
178 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS
179 TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE
180 PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
181 REPAIR OR CORRECTION.
183 10. IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING
184 WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR
185 REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES,
186 INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING
187 OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
188 TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY
189 YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
190 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
191 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
193 END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
195 Appendix: How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
197 If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest
198 possible use to humanity, the best way to achieve this is to make it
199 free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these
202 To do so, attach the following notices to the program. It is safest to
203 attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively convey
204 the exclusion of warranty; and each file should have at least the
205 "copyright" line and a pointer to where the full notice is found.
207 <one line to give the program's name and a brief idea of what it does.>
208 Copyright (C) 19yy <name of author>
210 This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
211 it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
212 the Free Software Foundation; either version 1, or (at your option)
215 This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
216 but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
217 MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
218 GNU General Public License for more details.
220 You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
221 along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
224 Also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail.
226 If the program is interactive, make it output a short notice like this
227 when it starts in an interactive mode:
229 Gnomovision version 69, Copyright (C) 19xx name of author
230 Gnomovision comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY; for details type `show w'.
231 This is free software, and you are welcome to redistribute it
232 under certain conditions; type `show c' for details.
234 The hypothetical commands `show w' and `show c' should show the
235 appropriate parts of the General Public License. Of course, the
236 commands you use may be called something other than `show w' and `show
237 c'; they could even be mouse-clicks or menu items--whatever suits your
240 You should also get your employer (if you work as a programmer) or your
241 school, if any, to sign a "copyright disclaimer" for the program, if
242 necessary. Here a sample; alter the names:
244 Yoyodyne, Inc., hereby disclaims all copyright interest in the
245 program `Gnomovision' (a program to direct compilers to make passes
246 at assemblers) written by James Hacker.
248 <signature of Ty Coon>, 1 April 1989
249 Ty Coon, President of Vice
251 That's all there is to it!