Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 9:09 UTC (Tue) by mjw (subscriber, #16740)
In reply to: Applies to any copyleft licence by epa
Parent article: A new GCC runtime library license snag?

No, I don't think it is a real problem with the GPLv2 either. The problem seems more that people take the clarifications of the GPLv3 "patent grants are explicit when distributing code", "signing bits needed at runtime are part of the corresponding sources to get the runtime binary", "the exception to the system library clause doesn't trump the separate works clause clarification", etc. as if those weren't already (implied) in GPLv2.

What seems to be happening is that instead of taking these as clarifications of the intent of v2, they are taken as some kind of fatal flaws in the old text. Instead of taking v3 and using it as a guide to the intend of v2.

Things would be much easier if people saw v3 as just a clarification of the text and intent of what v2 always already was about.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 12:10 UTC (Tue) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link] (6 responses)

I don't think the intent of the licence is relevant here. The GPL version 2 says that if you distribute a derived work then you must distribute the whole work under GPL version 2. Not 'under GPLv2 or another licence that has the same intent'.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 12:25 UTC (Tue) by mjw (subscriber, #16740) [Link] (4 responses)

Of course the intend is important. As pointed out above the intent of the system library exception was clarified in GPLv3 and it could be argued that was also what was intended with v2, since that is what Eben himself claimed. If so, the "nit" about how to precisely interpret the wording of "accompanies" in the exception to the exception disappears and all would be fine for everybody.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 20:07 UTC (Tue) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link] (3 responses)

Ah, I see. You are right. Although if intent is counted, the intent of the copyright holder of the code (who made the decision to grant a licence to it under GPLv2) may be more important than the intent of the person who wrote the licence.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 20:12 UTC (Tue) by hppnq (guest, #14462) [Link]

One has to assume that the intent of the person who choose the license was to try and understand the intent of the person who wrote it. ;-)

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 29, 2009 8:07 UTC (Wed) by mjw (subscriber, #16740) [Link] (1 responses)

Yes, you are right, in the end it is the copyright holder of the GPLv2-only work whose intent counts the most. But do you really believe that if the FSF says "oops, a specific literal reading could cause a problem for free operation systems, and that obviously isn't the intention, so we explicitly say that and make sure that in GPLv3 such textual ambiguity doesn't exist." That there are copyright holders that will say "yes, I specifically choose GPLv2-only to cause a problem for people wanting to read that particular exception language as intending to cause trouble for free operating systems like Debian"?

IMHO, unless a copyright holder explicitly tells you to ignore the stated intent of the license drafter, you can safely ignore that possibility.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 29, 2009 17:54 UTC (Wed) by dlang (guest, #313) [Link]

the FSF claims that GPLv3 just 'clarifies' or corrects weaknesses in GPLv2, but many other people disagree.

Applies to any copyleft licence

Posted Jul 28, 2009 21:08 UTC (Tue) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

Note that in a sense it is 'under GPLv2 or another licence that has the same intent'. If you take some BSD code and combine it with GPL2 code the result can be licensed under GPL2, but that doesn't change the licence of the BSD code. It can't, only the copyright holder can do that. Any subsequent user can remove all the GPL2 stuff and be left with a BSD licensed chunk of code.

It basically all it means is that all constituent parts must meet *at least* the requirements of the GPL2 but it may grant more rights. The problem being that whatever GCC is doing grants less.

Messy, but I'm not sure if there's any easy solution here (other than the FSF blinking).