I do appreciate the intention behind GPLv3. And it does has a lot of good updates over GPLv2.
The reason why I said it's impractical to include GPLv3 code in a system that also has secret sauce (maybe a special control loop or some audio plugins) is more about sauce protection.
If somebody has access to replace GPLv3 components with their own versions, then they effectively have the ability to read from the filesystem, and to control what's in it (at least partially).
So if I had parts that I wanted to keep secret and/or unmodifiable (maybe downloaded items from an app store), I'd have to find some way to separate out anything that's GPLv3 (and also probably constrain the GPLv3 binaries with cgroups to protect against the binaries being replaced with something nefarious). Or I'd have to avoid GPLv3 code in my product. Not because it requires me to release non-GPL code, but more because it requires me to provide write access to the filesystem.
And I guess that maybe GPLv3 is working as intended there. Not my place to judge if the license restrictions are good or bad. But it does mean that GPLv3 code can't easily be shipped on products that also have files which the developer wants to keep as a trade secret (or files that are pirateable). With the end result that most GNU packages become off-limits to a lot of embedded systems developers.
The reason why I said it's impractical to include GPLv3 code in a system that also has secret sauce (maybe a special control loop or some audio plugins) is more about sauce protection.
If somebody has access to replace GPLv3 components with their own versions, then they effectively have the ability to read from the filesystem, and to control what's in it (at least partially).
So if I had parts that I wanted to keep secret and/or unmodifiable (maybe downloaded items from an app store), I'd have to find some way to separate out anything that's GPLv3 (and also probably constrain the GPLv3 binaries with cgroups to protect against the binaries being replaced with something nefarious). Or I'd have to avoid GPLv3 code in my product. Not because it requires me to release non-GPL code, but more because it requires me to provide write access to the filesystem.
And I guess that maybe GPLv3 is working as intended there. Not my place to judge if the license restrictions are good or bad. But it does mean that GPLv3 code can't easily be shipped on products that also have files which the developer wants to keep as a trade secret (or files that are pirateable). With the end result that most GNU packages become off-limits to a lot of embedded systems developers.