[FFmpeg-devel] Licensing issue with idct_mmx.c

[Alexandre Colucci]

> Alexandre Colucci <alexandre <at> elgato.com> writes:
> 
>> The file idct_mmx.c (libavcodec/x86/idct_mmx.c) has a GPL license which
>> conflicts with the rest of the libavcodec files.
>> 
>> This file is apparently not used anywhere.
>> 
>> Is this file really needed
> 
>> (mmx is an old architecture)?
> 
> Note that this is a very bad argument...
> 
>> Would it be possible to change the license to LGPL
> 
> This is probably not possible.
> 
>> or move it outside of libavcodec?
>> The presence of the GPL license forces the client of the libavcodec to
>> manually remove the file, instead of using libavcodec as is.
> 
> Could you elaborate?
> I do not think this is the case.

I have an application that uses libavcodec and I don't want to use GPL code. CONFIG-GPL is disable so my binary doesn't contain GPL code.
But if I copy the libavcodec folder in my source code, my source code would contain the file idct_mmx.c which is GPL. Having a GPL source file (even if not compiled) in my repository sounds like a major licensing issue to me.

It appears that idct_mmx.c is the only GPL file in the folder libavcodec so I was wondering if it could not be moved outside of the libavcodec, in a folder called for example libavcodec-GPL.

Thanks,
Alexandre