Does anyone have an opinion on how this might apply to plug-in dissectors.
I'm writing a dissector for a patented protocol. The intent is to keep it
inside the company, but there's always a chance someone will get hold of
it. I was assuming that as a separate piece of software, making use of
Ethereal facilities, I was reasonably safe. After all, I don't think
Apples Quick Time plug-in for Mozilla puts Quick Time source under GPL.
Gerald has already stated his opinion in this regard.
The plugin interface was not intended to be used as a vehicle to distribute
proprietary binary only
packet dissectors.
Thus Gerald as well as Myself and possible other ethereal developers do
NOT want or allow binary only
distributions of protocol dissectors.
In case the protocol is so secret that the source code can not be
distributed, there is no need to distribute protocol dissectors to third
parties or customers either.
If it is just for internal use, then you just dont have to distribute the
software and thus GPL is no issue.
If it is to use ethereal as some sort of value add and you intend to
distribute it as a binary only extension to Ethereal, perhaps you should use
Sniffer Pro or NetMon instead since they both ahve developer kits and is
also licence compatible with what you want.
_________________________________________________________________
E-mail just got a whole lot better. New ninemsn Premium. Click here
http://ninemsn.com.au/premium/landing.asp
