a python license problem?

[Jayden]

Python is under GPL compatible. If I develop a python code, convert it to executable and distribute the executable as a commercial software. May I need to make my source code open?

If python is under GPL, is the answer different? Thanks a lot!!

 

[Benjamin Kaplan]

Python is under GPL compatible. If I develop a python code, convert it to executable and distribute the executable as a commercial software. May I need to make my source code open?

If python is under GPL, is the answer different? Thanks a lot!!

"GPL compatible" is not a license. It's a quality of the license.
Python's license is compatible with the GPL, which means that you can
use Python in software licensed under the GPL

Python's license (which is available at
http://docs.python.org/license.html ) does not require Python code to
be open source, nor does it prohibit commercial use.

And even if Python was under the GPL, you would still be able to
release your own programs without opening the source. You just
wouldn't be able to modify Python without releasing your changes.
That's how the userland in Mac OS X is still closed-source despite
being compiled with GCC.

 

[Terry Reedy]

If you write new code, without deriving your work from the code of
Python itself, then the license of the Python code cannot affect what
you many do with what you wrote – because the copyright on Python does
not affect works not derived from it.

Despite the wishes of copyright maximalists (and the PSF are not
copyright maximalists, to my knowledge), there are still limits to the
scope of copyright.

If by 'copyright maximalists' you mean the authors of translation
programs that claim copyright to translations, then they are really
'copyright grabbers' in that they are denying copyright to original
authors of the codes translated.

The usual basis for the grab is that the translated code must run with a
runtime component from the translator. The runtime may or may not be
physically bundled with the translated code, just as Python code can run
with either a separately installed python or a bundled python, as in
freeze or py2exe. The PSF explicitly says that distribution of such
bundles is allowed for CPython as long as one summarized what one is
doing. (See terms 2 and 3.)

Python is not under GPL. But unless you are deriving a work from Python
and distributing the result, that doesn't alter the answer.

To be really clear, the 'Python license' is the license for the Python
x.y.z software and documentation distributed by the Python Software
Foundation. Other implementations have their own copyright and licenses.
Code is copyrighted and licensed by the author or assignee.