Re: as for Calc and the math library

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> From: Suhail Singh <suhailsingh247@gmail.com>
> Cc: Suhail Singh <suhailsingh247@gmail.com>,  gerd.moellmann@gmail.com,
>   nicolas@n16f.net,  arthur.miller@live.com,  emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Wed, 14 Aug 2024 12:00:35 -0400
> 
> Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:
> 
> > The way we do it when loading modules requires the _loaded_ library to
> > declare itself compatible, by exporting a symbol of a certain name.
> > That is an action by the library we load, not by the Lisp program
> > which loads it.
> 
> Thank you for elaborating. In the context of Emacs, having a claim of
> GPL compatibility is not sufficient; it also matters who is making such
> a claim and asserting compliance with the license terms.
> 
> IIUC, the claim has to be made either by the library itself (the case of
> modules), or by the Emacs maintainers (the case of an allow-list).
> However, a claim made by the user (or a repackager) of a library is
> insufficient.  Is my understanding correct?

Yes.

> To test my understanding of the above, as a counterfactual, if there was
> a standardized way by which libraries identified their license (perhaps
> by exporting a pre-determined symbol containing something like an SPDX
> license identifier), that too would have been acceptable as long as
> emacs-ffi checked against an allow-list of compatible-with-GPL-licenses.
> Is that correct?

Yes, I think so.