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freedom than the ordinary General Public License. It also provides other free software developers Less
of an advantage over competing non-free programs. These disadvantages are the reason we use the
ordinary General Public License for many libraries. However, the Lesser license provides advantages in
certain special circumstances.
For example, on rare occasions, there may be a special need to encourage the widest possible use of a
certain library, so that it becomes a de-facto standard. To achieve this, non-free programs must be
allowed to use the library. A more frequent case is that a free library does the same job as widely used
non-free libraries. In this case, there is little to gain by limiting the free library to free software only, so
we use the Lesser General Public License.
In other cases, permission to use a particular library in non-free programs enables a greater number of
people to use a large body of free software. For example, permission to use the GNU C Library in non-
free programs enables many more people to use the whole GNU operating system, as well as its variant,
the GNU/Linux operating system.
Although the Lesser General Public License is Less protective of the users' freedom, it does ensure that
the user of a program that is linked with the Library has the freedom and the wherewithal to run that
program using a modified version of the Library.
The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and modification follow. Pay close attention to
the difference between a "work based on the library" and a "work that uses the library". The former
contains code derived from the library, whereas the latter must be combined with the library in order to
run.
GNU LESSER GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
0. This License Agreement applies to any software library or other program which contains a notice
placed by the copyright holder or other authorized party saying it may be distributed under the terms of
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The "Library", below, refers to any such software library or work which has been distributed under these
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limitation in the term "modification".)
"Source code" for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it. For a
library, complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains, plus any associated
interface definition files, plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the library.
Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are
outside its scope. The act of running a program using the Library is not restricted, and output from such
a program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Library (independent of the use
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the program that uses the Library does.
1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Library's complete source code as you receive it,
in any medium, provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
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You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer
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