Hi Carsten, Thank you for this information. It helps to clear up a lot of things. I will tone down on licensing for this mailing list.
Regards, John S On Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 3:36 PM Carsten Strotmann via Amforth-devel < [email protected]> wrote: > Hi John, > > On 11 Feb 2026, at 17:06, John Sarabacha wrote: > > > Hi Carsten, > > So if I wrote a Windows11 application and gave it a GPLv3 licensing and > > included > > the header file "windows.h", it and all it's nested includes would now > be > > GPLv3 and > > Microsoft is forced to release it's source code with any distribution. > > Not Microsoft is forced, you (the developer) is forced. > > The licensing failure would be on your side in this case. Including > "windows.h" in your code would make it part of a GPLv3 licensed work, but > you are not allowed to do that in case the license of "windows.h" is not > compatible with the GPLv3 (I have no idea what the licensing of "windows.h" > is, it might be compatible with GPLv3, it might be redistributable. But > quick research indicates it is not). > > Once you release that Windows11 application containing GPLv3 code, you > would need to also publish "windows.h", as it is part of the full source > code. But the redistribution license of "windows.h" might not allow that, > so you are not allowed to use "windows.h" in an GPLv3 application in the > first place. > > Using the original Microsoft header files with GPL licensed code is in a > grey area. Even Microsoft does not know the implications (see > https://github.com/microsoft/win32metadata/issues/766 ). > > That is why GPL licensed compiler for Windows come with their own language > bindings and header (such as MinGW) that are GPL or permissive licensed and > not rely on the Microsoft versions of these header files. > > > This discussion is now very much offtopic for this mailing list, as it is > about software licensing, and not amForth specific. I recommend to bring > this discussion to a list that has been set up for these kind of > discussions, such as lists.sfconservancy.org Mailing Lists. ( > https://lists.sfconservancy.org/mailman/listinfo/). There it is more > likely to find good answers on your questions. > > Greetings > > Carsten > > > _______________________________________________ > Amforth-devel mailing list for http://amforth.sf.net/ > [email protected] > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/amforth-devel > _______________________________________________ Amforth-devel mailing list for http://amforth.sf.net/ [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/amforth-devel
