Perl Licensing - dev.perl.org

<!DOCTYPE html> <html lang="en"> <head> <meta charset="utf-8"> <meta http-equiv="X-UA-Compatible" content="IE=edge"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1">  <link rel="shortcut icon" href="https://cdn.perl.org/perlweb/favicon.ico" /> <title>Perl Licensing - dev.perl.org</title> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="https://cdn.perl.org/perlweb/css/perlweb_bootstrap.min.css" />  <link href='https://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Lato:400,100,300,700,900' rel='stylesheet' type='text/css'>   </head> <body class="page-dev"> <nav class="navbar navbar-inverse" data-height="120"> <div class="container-fluid"> <div class="navbar-header"> <button type="button" class="navbar-toggle collapsed" data-toggle="collapse" data-target="#navbar" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="navbar"> <span class="sr-only">Toggle navigation</span> <span class="icon-bar"></span> <span class="icon-bar"></span> <span class="icon-bar"></span> </button> <a class="navbar-brand" href="/"> <img src="https://cdn.perl.org/perlweb/images/logo_dev.svg" alt="Perl Licensing | Perl for the next 30 years" class="page-logo"> </a> </div> <div id="navbar" class="collapse navbar-collapse"> <ul class="list-inline text-center nav navbar-nav navbar-right"> <li class="sub"> <a href="/perl5/">Perl</a> </li> </ul> </div> </div> </nav> <div class="jumbotron jumbotron-internal"> <div class="container text-center"> <h1>Perl Licensing</h1> <p></p> </div> </div> <div class="container"> <BLOCKQUOTE> <P> Perl5 is Copyright © 1993 and later, by Larry Wall and others. </P> <P> It is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of either: </P> <P> a) the <A HREF="gpl1.html">GNU General Public License</A> as published by the <A HREF="http://www.fsf.org/">Free Software Foundation; either <A HREF="gpl1.html">version 1</A>, or (at your option) any <A HREF="http://www.fsf.org/licenses/licenses.html#GNUGPL">later version</A>, or </P> <P> b) the <A HREF="artistic.html">"Artistic License"</A>. </P> <BR><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE STYLE="background: #dddddd; padding: 10px; border: solid black 1px; text-align: justify; "> <P> For those of you that choose to use the GNU General Public License, my interpretation of the GNU General Public License is that no Perl script falls under the terms of the GPL unless you explicitly put said script under the terms of the GPL yourself. </P> <P> Furthermore, any object code linked with perl does not automatically fall under the terms of the GPL, provided such object code only adds definitions of subroutines and variables, and does not otherwise impair the resulting interpreter from executing any standard Perl script. I consider linking in C subroutines in this manner to be the moral equivalent of defining subroutines in the Perl language itself. You may sell such an object file as proprietary provided that you provide or offer to provide the Perl source, as specified by the GNU General Public License. (This is merely an alternate way of specifying input to the program.) You may also sell a binary produced by the dumping of a running Perl script that belongs to you, provided that you provide or offer to provide the Perl source as specified by the GPL. (The fact that a Perl interpreter and your code are in the same binary file is, in this case, a form of mere aggregation.) </P> <P> This is my interpretation of the GPL. If you still have concerns or difficulties understanding my intent, feel free to contact me. Of course, the Artistic License spells all this out for your protection, so you may prefer to use that. </P> <DIV ALIGN="RIGHT"> <FONT SIZE="+1"> <I> -- Larry Wall</I> </FONT> </DIV> </BLOCKQUOTE> </BLOCKQUOTE> </div> <div class="container-fluid space-top-xl"> <footer class="row"> <div class="footer"> <ul class="col-xs-12 col-sm-2 list-unstyled"> <li><h4>Perl.org</h4></li> <li><a href="http://www.perl.org/">www</a></li> <li><a href="http://blogs.perl.org/">blogs</a></li> <li><a href="http://jobs.perl.org/">jobs</a></li> <li><a href="http://learn.perl.org/">learn</a></li> <li><a href="http://dev.perl.org/">dev</a></li> </ul> <ul class="col-xs-12 col-sm-2 list-unstyled"> <li><h4>Connect</h4></li> <li><a href="/siteinfo.html">Site Info</a></li>  </ul> <div class="col-xs-12 footer-info"> <p class="copyright"> <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/"><img alt="Creative Commons License" style="border-width:0" src="https://cdn.perl.org/perlweb/images/icons/creativecommons-by-nc-nd-3.0-us-80x15.png" /></a> 漏 2002-2025 Perl.org </p> </div> </div> </footer> </div>  <script async src="https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=UA-50555-6"></script> <script> window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'UA-50555-6', { 'link_attribution': true, 'custom_map': {'dimension1': 'protocol'} }); gtag('event', 'pageload', {'protocol': window.location.protocol}); </script> <script type="text/javascript" src="https://cdn.perl.org/perlweb/js/perlweb_bootstrap.min.js" charset="UTF-8"></script> </body> </html>

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Perl Licensing - dev.perl.org