Subject: Re: Copyrighted header files (was: reading/writing...)
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.no>
Date: 2000/01/28
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3158075016590411@naggum.no>

* "Fernando D. Mato Mira" <matomira@iname.com>
| Itchy question: What happens when the specification is (partly) expressed
| in a copyrighted C header file?  Even if you type yourself every byte,
| it'll be essentially the same thing.

  invoke "fair use" and claim that you cannot copyright numerical constants.

  copyright does not cover reproducing functional equivalence, so you could
  argue that you're not reproducing more than you have to in order to use
  the specification for its intended purpose (which by law is prevented
  from being "to screw the readers" :).

#:Erik