msgfmt.py and pygettext.py are LGPL or LGPL-compatible?

[Chris Angelico]

On Tue, May 26, 2015 at 4:42 AM, Alan Evangelista
<alanoe at linux.vnet.ibm.com> wrote:
> https://docs.python.org/2/library/gettext.html suggests that I use msgfmt.py
> and pygettext.py, available
> at Python Subversion ( http://svn.python.org/view/python/trunk/Tools/i18n/).
> What license those executable
> scripts use? Are they LGPL? I want to convert these executables to Python
> modules and use them in my
> applications, but I fear the viral effect of LGPL over my code. Could
> someone clarify if I can do it
> without legal concerns?

Where did you get the svn link from? If nothing else, you'll get a
newer version of the file by looking in Mercurial, as the file you
link to hasn't changed in some years.

Those files aren't binary executables, so you can just have a look at
them to see if there's a license comment. And AFAIK, you should be
able to keep them completely separate from the rest of your code. I
don't entirely follow what they're doing (only skimmed the page), but
my understanding is that you would use these tools as part of building
your code. It's like using gcc to compile a C program - gcc itself is
GPL (not even LGPL), but that doesn't affect your code at all.

But I'm no lawyer, just a programmer.

ChrisA