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This license, the Lesser General Public License, applies to some specially designated software
packages--typically libraries--of the Free Software Foundation and other authors who decide to
use it. You can use it too, but we suggest you fi rst think carefully about whether this license or
the ordinary General Public License is the better strategy to use in any particular case, based
on the explanations below.
When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom of use, not price. Our General
Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of
free software (and charge for this service if you wish); that you receive source code or can get it
if you want it; that you can change the software and use pieces of it in new free programs; and
that you are informed that you can do these things.
To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid distributors to deny you these
rights or to ask you to surrender these rights. These restrictions translate to certain responsibili-
ties for you if you distribute copies of the library or if you modify it.
For example, if you distribute copies of the library, whether gratis or for a fee, you must give the
recipients all the rights that we gave you. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get
the source code. If you link other code with the library, you must provide complete object fi les to
the recipients, so that they can relink them with the library after making changes to the library
and recompiling it. And you must show them these terms so they know their rights.
We protect your rights with a two-step method: (1) we copyright the library, and (2) we offer you
this license, which gives you legal permission to copy, distribute and/or modify the library.
To protect each distributor, we want to make it very clear that there is no warranty for the free li-
brary. Also, if the library is modifi ed by someone else and passed on, the recipients should know
that what they have is not the original version, so that the original author’s reputation will not be
affected by problems that might be introduced by others.
Finally, software patents pose a constant threat to the existence of any free program. We wish
to make sure that a company cannot effectively restrict the users of a free program by obtain-
ing a restrictive license from a patent holder. Therefore, we insist that any patent license ob-
tained for a version of the library must be consistent with the full freedom of use specifi ed in this
license.
Most GNU software, including some libraries, is covered by the ordinary GNU General Public
License. This license, the GNU Lesser General Public License, applies to certain designated
libraries, and is quite different from the ordinary General Public License. We use this license for
certain libraries in order to permit linking those libraries into non-free programs.
