Re: libguile and readline

[Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>]

Instead of focusing on the wrongness of what we are going to stop
doing, let's focus on the rightness of what we will start doing.  Here
is a rewrite that gives the same information but in a more positive
way:


* Changes to the distribution

** Readline support is no longer included with Guile by default.

Based on the different license terms of Guile and Readline, we
concluded that Guile should not *by default* cause the linking of
Readline into an application program.  Readline support is now offered
as a separate module, which is linked into an application only when
you explicitly specify it.

Although Guile is GNU software, its distribution terms add a special
to the usual GNU General Public License (GPL).  Guile's license
includes a clause that allows you to link Guile with non-free
programs.  We add this exception so as not to put Guile at a
disadvantage vis-a-vis other extensibility packages that support other
languages.

In contrast, the GNU Readline library is distributed under the GNU
General Public License pure and simple.  This means that you may not
link Readline, even dynamically, into an application unless it is
distributed under a free software license that is compatible the GPL.

Because of this difference in distribution terms, an application that
can use Guile may not be able to use Readline.  Now users will be
explicitly offered two independent decisions about the use of these
two packages.