[MPlayer-dev-eng] violation of the GPL

[Billy Biggs]

Joey Parrish (joey at nicewarrior.org):

> I got an email from someone recently informing me that I am violating
> the GPL with concerns to MPlayer.
> 
> I don't distribute the full source on my cygwin MPlayer webpage, just
> a patchset.  This is because I don't want to keep up lots of big
> source archives that could get out of sync with MPlayer CVS.

  Any time you post a binary the complete source used to build that
binary should be posted with it.  This is because if I need to change
something in a (potentially very old!) binary I have installed, I can
save the full source used and I know it will both compile and work
without modifications.

  So, there are practical reasons why the GPL has this requirement.

> My questions are:
>  1) Do you (anyone) have a problem with my policy?

  I think I do in principle, FWIW.  It's a growing problem too,
especially with lots of people distributing 'live CDs' and not having
corresponding source CDs.  So, you're not alone in finding the
requirement inconvenient (or not understanding it/respecting it!).

  -Billy