Okay, I''ve been walking around the last few months with a great idea for a game I could make quite easily. So, I started to do some planning. Amongst others, I wanted to check if I could reasonably create a commercial game useing the tools I was planning to. However, those licenses are kindda driving me crazy, especially since English is not my native language. Anyone to clarify some things a bit? The SDL libraries are covered under the LGPL licence. The LGPL licence states that it''s designed to allow linking with non-free programs, while keeping the libs itself protected open-source. That''s OK with me, but in section 5 of the terms, I see this :

quote: A program that contains no derivative of any portion of the Library, but is designed to work with the Library by being compiled or linked with it, is called a "work that uses the Library". Such a work, in isolation, is not a derivative work of the Library, and therefore falls outside the scope of this License. However, linking a "work that uses the Library" with the Library creates an executable that is a derivative of the Library (because it contains portions of the Library), rather than a "work that uses the library". The executable is therefore covered by this License. Section 6 states terms for distribution of such executables.

Now, the Delphi-Jedi SDL-headers I''m useing are licenced under the Mozilla public licence, distributed as source-code. No problem, because the MPL states :

quote: You may create a Larger Work by combining Covered Code with other code not governed by the terms of this License and distribute the Larger Work as a single product. In such a case, You must make sure the requirements of this License are fulfilled for the Covered Code.

But those headers are linking to the SDL DLL''s/.so files. So, if I compile any program useing those Jedi SDL headers, it will link to the SDL/.so files, and thus the program will be "a derivative of the library", which means I''ll have to distribute it as either GPL or LGPL. Am I correct, or am I missing something here? Doesn''t this mean that it is virtually impossible to distribute binaries only of programs useing LGPL-covered libraries? In short : Does this combination of LGPL/MPL licenses allow me to create a commercial/closed source game useing SDL libs?

If you link dynamically to SDL, you don''t have to give out your source. At least if I''m reading this right.

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