RE: GPL vs. OpenSSL license -- LINUX5250

        Is it not possible to hook into the base SSL support of the OS via it's
APIs rather than building based on a specific SSL package external to the
project and OS?  I always thought that SSL was just a wrapper put around the
packet of information right before sending and if this is true any SSL
wrapper should suffice, right?

        This is just a theory I had, during the install/build of tn5250 the user
could be asked to point at the correct file already installed therefore
instantly adding secure support.  Like I said this is just a theory I had, I
do not know the Win API nor do I really know if it would work.

        Also it might be worth while to look into openoffice's SSL support as 
it is
OSS GPL'd and has SSL included.

        All just ideas, maybe I should start contributing to this project( just
another idea ;| ) instead of just using it!!!

______________________________________________________________

Duane Kehoe                                                   phone:
414.908.1814
Programmer / Analyst                                       fax:
414.908.1601
Weyco Group, Inc.                                           email:
dkehoe@weycogroup.com


-----Original Message-----
From: linux5250-admin@midrange.com
[mailto:linux5250-admin@midrange.com]On Behalf Of Scott Klement
Sent: Tuesday, February 05, 2002 12:27 PM
To: tn5250
Subject: Re: [LINUX5250] GPL vs. OpenSSL license



On 5 Feb 2002, Steve Fox wrote:
>
> On Mon, 2002-02-04 at 17:48, Carey Evans wrote:
> > Sorry to be the bearer of bad news about laws etc. again, but I've
> > realised that, due to the interaction between the advertising clause
> > in the OpenSSL license (conditions 3 and 6), and section 6 of the GNU
> > GPL, nobody is actually allowed to distribute binaries of tn5250.
>
> Why not use Netscape Security Services (NSS) for SSL support like
> Evolution (the GNOME PIM)
> <http://www.ximian.com/products/ximian_evolution/> does? They are
> cross-platform, and licensed under the MPL, GPL, and LGPL (take your
> pick :)
>
> See http://www.mozilla.org/projects/security/pki/nss/ for details.
>

Well... that WOULD solve the license issue.  A few things I'd like to
point out about using the NSS, however:

 -- NSS requires the Netscape Portable Runtime (NSPR) as well as the
      Netscape Build Environment...   This would make it somewhat more
      complicated to build the emulator.

 -- I know that FreeBSD ships with OpenSSL.  I believe the Linuxes do
      too...  So setting up OpenSSL is a non-issue for us Un*x people.

 -- To build NSS on Windows requires both Cygwin and MS Visual C++.
      Cygwin isn't that big of a deal, it complicates the setup
      instructions but at least it's open source.  MSVC however is
      not.  It's at least USD$ 500!

 -- I'd have to re-write sslstream.c completely (which isn't that
      big of a deal) and I'd have to make the win32 code work with
      MSVC (unless, of course, we wanted to require both MinGW and MSVC)

So... wow, that adds a lot of extra work in setting up our build
environment.  And makes our free emulator somewhat expensive for Windows
users.

All this because we love the GPL so much?


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