Obligations when shipping 3rd party GPL libraries with my GPL application [closed]

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i am using several 3rd party GPL libraries with my GPL licensed application (so copyleft should not be a problem). I am planning to "ship" those libraries together with my application in one zip file, so that a user of my app doesn't have to download the libs separately.

I originally intended to include not only the libraries themselves, but also their source files. The problem is this: one of the libs i am using (Xuggler) is quite big (~ 40mb) and its source files are even bigger (~100mb, zipped). Including those sources would more than tripple the size of my zip file.

So my question is this: does the GPL obligate me to provide the sources for utilized GPL libs "directly", i.e. included in my zip file, or is it "good enough" to provide a link to those sources (e.g. a link to the github repo or similar).

P.S.: the sources to my own application will of course be included "directly", this is strictly about the sources of the 3rd party GPL libs my application is using!

Thanks!

Answer 1

You don't have to include the sources in the same package as the executable, but you have to:

1. Include a README/LICENSE file where you specify which projects you're using, with their respective licenses, and give instructions for obtaining the sources (like pointing to an URL)
2. If you actually modify the sources of those files, you should also have those changes publicly available