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by lugus35 3440 days ago
Why use a GPL license ? This kind of port could have been the occasion to get rid of this type of license.

Why port Emacs to Rust ?, it adds no value to users. Why not develop a modern GUI like Intellij IDEA with a Common Lisp implementation underneath like SBCL ?

2 comments

If you changed the license you'd have to do a clean room implementation, and even then deal with potential legal issues from the... personalities... associated with the GPL.
You mean the author who wrote his own license to specify how his work may be distributed?

Any person who write their own license to specify in fine details how the work may be used and distributed is going to have a very strong (and likely legal) issue with people who try to circumvent that license. Even a clean room implementation would need source material as instructions, and writing such specification without any copyrighted elements of the source would be quite a challenge when dealing with a very large program that has compatibility to a large ecosystem as its primary feature.

Because GPL license protects from stealing of code without contributed back.

Apple chose FreeBSD as base for it OS, Google chose Linux. Look at sad state of FreeBSD now.