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Hi,

On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
"Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:

> At the moment we represent the software we consider under GNU General
> Public License, version 2 of the license, but we cannot be sure it's
> alright to license it to "any later version". Linux kernel for
> instance is licensed _only_ under GPLv2, but not any later version.

I don't think this is a good solution, as in any case the package is
licensed under GPL-2, so how about for the packages that only support
GPL-2 we set:

LICENSE="GPL-2"

While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a special
case of multiple licensing) we do:

LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"

when it becomes available?

Best,
Yuri.

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Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
> "Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
>> At the moment we represent the software we consider under GNU General
>> Public License, version 2 of the license, but we cannot be sure it's
>> alright to license it to "any later version". Linux kernel for
>> instance is licensed _only_ under GPLv2, but not any later version.
>
> I don't think this is a good solution, as in any case the package is
> licensed under GPL-2, so how about for the packages that only support
> GPL-2 we set:
>
> LICENSE="GPL-2"
>
> While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a special
> case of multiple licensing) we do:
>
> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"

If you meant:

LICENSE=" || ( GPL-2 GPL-3 )"

then I agree ;)

It would be under Either the GPL-2 OR a later version, not both, yes?

-Alec Warner

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On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 17:06:32 -0500
Alec Warner <antarus@gentoo.org> wrote:

> Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
> > "Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:
> >
> >> At the moment we represent the software we consider under GNU
> >> General Public License, version 2 of the license, but we cannot be
> >> sure it's alright to license it to "any later version". Linux
> >> kernel for instance is licensed _only_ under GPLv2, but not any
> >> later version.
> >
> > I don't think this is a good solution, as in any case the package is
> > licensed under GPL-2, so how about for the packages that only
> > support GPL-2 we set:
> >
> > LICENSE="GPL-2"
> >
> > While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a
> > special case of multiple licensing) we do:
> >
> > LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"
>
> If you meant:
>
> LICENSE=" || ( GPL-2 GPL-3 )"
>
> then I agree ;)
>
> It would be under Either the GPL-2 OR a later version, not both, yes?

Right, thanks for catching that.

Yuri.

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On Friday 22 December 2006 22:53, Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
> While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a special
> case of multiple licensing) we do:
>
> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"
>
> when it becomes available?
There is one problem at least for this: to apply this method you'd have to
change _all_ the ebuilds in the tree referring to GPL-2 or later when GPL-3
is published, while with GPL-2+ we can start gradually now.

Also it would be more useful for users to know what can be licensed in 2+ and
what requires 2 strictly.

--
Diego "Flameeyes" Pettenò - http://farragut.flameeyes.is-a-geek.org/
Gentoo/Alt lead, Gentoo/FreeBSD, Video, Sound, ALSA, PAM, KDE, CJK, Ruby ...

Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò wrote:
> On Friday 22 December 2006 22:53, Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
>> While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a special
>> case of multiple licensing) we do:
>>
>> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"
>>
>> when it becomes available?
> There is one problem at least for this: to apply this method you'd have to
> change _all_ the ebuilds in the tree referring to GPL-2 or later when GPL-3
> is published, while with GPL-2+ we can start gradually now.
>
> Also it would be more useful for users to know what can be licensed in 2+ and
> what requires 2 strictly.
>
GPL-2+ would need to be a license GROUP however.

Say I approve only GPL-3 packages (cause' I hate patents, and I dislike
having a working system too!). This would encompass anything strictly
GPL-3 and also anything GPL-2+ (which would then be under 3 at my option
in this case).
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On Friday 22 December 2006 23:43, Alec Warner wrote:
> Say I approve only GPL-3 packages (cause' I hate patents, and I dislike
> having a working system too!).  This would encompass anything strictly
> GPL-3 and also anything GPL-2+ (which would then be under 3 at my option
> in this case).
Not really, as GPL-2 does not disallow DRM (_if_ GPL-3 will disallow them), so
if there's a software licensed under GPL-2+ that uses DRM, it couldn't be
used under GPL-3 terms even at your option.

--
Diego "Flameeyes" Pettenò - http://farragut.flameeyes.is-a-geek.org/
Gentoo/Alt lead, Gentoo/FreeBSD, Video, Sound, ALSA, PAM, KDE, CJK, Ruby ...

On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 23:31:04 +0100
"Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:

> On Friday 22 December 2006 22:53, Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
> > While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a
> > special case of multiple licensing) we do:
> >
> > LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"
> >
> > when it becomes available?
> There is one problem at least for this: to apply this method you'd
> have to change _all_ the ebuilds in the tree referring to GPL-2 or
> later when GPL-3 is published, while with GPL-2+ we can start
> gradually now.

Yes, this will require us to update ebuils once in like 5 (or 15?)
years to catch with FSF. But at the benefit of having less confusion
for users about "What the heck is a GPL-2+?" for at last the same period
of time.

GPL-2 is not a licence nor it is not a standard notation for that way
of having multilicencing. So users will have to check what's the
meaning of that + at the end of GPL-2+, so I think it'll create much
more confusion than the work of updating packages with each new version
of GPL.

Also there could be a case that softer v3 is out, FSF will rethink and
come up with something acceptable to Linus (and other people that
refuse to migrate), as (as far as I can understand) GPL-3 will not be
compatible with GPL-2. So there could be the case of having a package
licenced under GPL-2, GPL-2.1 or later. (This is just an example, I
actually have no idea whatever this will be the case of having a softer
GPL-3.x.)

> Also it would be more useful for users to know what can be licensed
> in 2+ and what requires 2 strictly.

This info can be easily and automatically extracted from LICENSE
variable by applying some boolean logic ;-)

Yuri.

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On Sat, Dec 23, 2006 at 12:10:44AM +0100, Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò wrote:
> On Friday 22 December 2006 23:43, Alec Warner wrote:
> > Say I approve only GPL-3 packages (cause' I hate patents, and I dislike
> > having a working system too!).  This would encompass anything strictly
> > GPL-3 and also anything GPL-2+ (which would then be under 3 at my option
> > in this case).
> Not really, as GPL-2 does not disallow DRM (_if_ GPL-3 will disallow them), so
> if there's a software licensed under GPL-2+ that uses DRM, it couldn't be
> used under GPL-3 terms even at your option.

I believe you're misunderstanding the DRM issue. There is nothing in the
GPL-3 draft that forbids DRM, except insofar as the DRM prevents the user
from exercising his/her GPL-granted rights, and it is not likely that
the final GPL-3 will forbid it. In plain English, as long as you're able
to modify, compile, and run the code, it's fine as far as the GPL is
concerned. And Gentoo being a source-based distro, you can already know
you're able to do all that.

It's also possible that I'm misunderstanding your message, of course. If
I am, would you please clarify?
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Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
[...]
> But at the benefit of having less confusion
> for users about "What the heck is a GPL-2+?" for at last the same period
> of time.
[...]
> So users will have to check what's the
> meaning of that + at the end of GPL-2+, so I think it'll create much
> more confusion than the work of updating packages with each new version
> of GPL.

I think naming them "GPL-2-only" and "GPL-2-or-later" will fix this issue,
especially if the note mentioned by Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò will be added.
If someone is really interested in knowing more about licenses or GPL he is
likely to already know the "GPL 2 or later"-thing, while those not interested
in it anyway are likely not to ask :-)

Maybe the question arising could be:
Did the author say "or later version" or did he say "or any later version" as
maybe (IANAL) it means only "2.*" without that 'any'
Something like that would make sense as I would want my software to be
licensed under 2.* since they should be compatible but include "fixes" if a
passage is unclear or creates problems in one or the other jurisdiction.

Stefan Schweizer wrote:
> I see little benifit in having GPL-2+ but a lot of potential confusion and a
> lot of work for developers to check all pkges.
What about creating a bug depending on some 11600 others for each package
until it is fixed? (kidding)
I agree on that, benefit would be rather small. IF a user really needs to
know, wether it is 2.* or also a later version at his opinion it would for
sure not be a problem to just look it up.

On the other hand, changing the license should, if at all, be done rather at
once than stepwise to avoid an inconsistend sceme, as I think this is what
would create confusion...


Ciao,

Daniel

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On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
"Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:

> GPL-2:
> Note: this license states that the software is licensed under GNU
> General Public License version 2, and you might not be able to
> consider it licensed under any later version.
>
> GPL-2+:
> Note: this license explicitly allows licensing under GNU General
> Public License version 2 or, at your option, any later version.
>
> Comments, ideas, proposals?

From a purist point of view, I'd be inclined to go with this route.
Pragmatically though, given the number of packages that do have the "or
later" clause compared to the number that don't, it might be simpler to
split them into GPL-2 (implying "or later") and GPL-2-only. That's just
a possible naming quibble though -- the idea I like.

The suggestion to convert all GPL-2-or-later packages to || ( GPL-2
GPL-3 ) won't scale -- what happens when GPL-2.1 or GPL-3.1 appear?
It's also an awful lot of work for something that is, when you get down
to it, wrong.


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On Friday 22 December 2006 22:53, Yuri Vasilevski wrote:
> Hi,
>
> On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
>
> "Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > At the moment we represent the software we consider under GNU General
> > Public License, version 2 of the license, but we cannot be sure it's
> > alright to license it to "any later version". Linux kernel for
> > instance is licensed _only_ under GPLv2, but not any later version.
>
> I don't think this is a good solution, as in any case the package is
> licensed under GPL-2, so how about for the packages that only support
> GPL-2 we set:
>
> LICENSE="GPL-2"
>
> While for the ones that support v2 or later (this is actually a special
> case of multiple licensing) we do:
>
> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-3"

I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or later" is a
license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the file have contents
like:
"This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for the GPL."

The LICENSE would then be:
LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-RENEW"

The advantage being that the renew clause is version independent, we don't
lose information, don't have to mutilate licenses (by adding text). If
desired it could even be used as LICENSE="|| (GPL-2 GPL-3) GPL-RENEW"

Paul

--
Paul de Vrieze
Gentoo Developer
Mail: pauldv@gentoo.org
Homepage: http://www.devrieze.net

On Sun, 24 Dec 2006 18:05:48 +0000
Stephen Bennett <spb@gentoo.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 22 Dec 2006 21:56:54 +0100
> "Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò" <flameeyes@gentoo.org> wrote:
>
> > GPL-2:
> > Note: this license states that the software is licensed under GNU
> > General Public License version 2, and you might not be able to
> > consider it licensed under any later version.
> >
> > GPL-2+:
> > Note: this license explicitly allows licensing under GNU General
> > Public License version 2 or, at your option, any later version.
> >
> > Comments, ideas, proposals?
>
> From a purist point of view, I'd be inclined to go with this route.
> Pragmatically though, given the number of packages that do have the
> "or later" clause compared to the number that don't, it might be
> simpler to split them into GPL-2 (implying "or later") and
> GPL-2-only. That's just a possible naming quibble though -- the idea
> I like.
>
> The suggestion to convert all GPL-2-or-later packages to || ( GPL-2
> GPL-3 ) won't scale -- what happens when GPL-2.1 or GPL-3.1 appear?
> It's also an awful lot of work for something that is, when you get
> down to it, wrong.

I agree. Diego's proposal works fine in practice; the 'might not' in
the description for GPL-2 makes it clear that we don't guarantee to
have updated all existing ebuilds to use the GPL-2+ name where
appropriate.

Doing it on an opportunity basis should be fine, so I don't think we
need to worry about doing GPL-2-only. Saying GPL-2 when GPL-3 is also
acceptable isn't critical in the near term; it won't cause people to
install stuff with a license they don't accept. It won't really be
needed until someone wants to have GPL-3 stuff but no GPL-2-only stuff
- I think it's reasonable to avoid supporting that for a while, at
least. If we start now, with all new commits having GPL-2 changed to
GPL-2+ if appropriate, after a while we can change the GPL-2
description to be GPL-2 only and let GPL-3-only people (there's
always one) bug about packages that are still unchanged when they hit
them.

--
Kevin F. Quinn

On Wednesday 03 January 2007 22:54, Steve Long wrote:
> Paul de Vrieze wrote:
> > I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or later" is
> > a license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the file have
> > contents like:
> > "This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for the
> > GPL."
> >
> > The LICENSE would then be:
> > LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-RENEW"
> >
> > The advantage being that the renew clause is version independent, we
> > don't lose information, don't have to mutilate licenses (by adding text).
> > If desired it could even be used as LICENSE="|| (GPL-2 GPL-3) GPL-RENEW"
>
> That last bit's excessive IMO. It seems to add complexity- does it mean you
> can have either of the GPL2 or 3 plus any later from that version? Why not
> just cover that with your first example, which I like a lot- it spells out
> the later clause, and as you say, is version-independent.
>
> So GPL-3 GPL-RENEW could be specified, as well as simple GPL-2, or GPL-2
> GPL-RENEW. (Just spelling it out, sorry.)
>
> I'm thinking about your example and I can see how it covers a user who
> *wants* to use GPL-3 (eg for their own code) but I still think that comes
> under GPL-2 GPL-RENEW as it's clearly allowed.

My idea for the second way is basically to make the life of tools easier. It
would make explicit that someone accepting GPL-3, but not GPL-2 would be able
to accept a GPL-2 and later license.

Paul

--
Paul de Vrieze
Gentoo Developer
Mail: pauldv@gentoo.org
Homepage: http://www.devrieze.net

On Wed, 3 Jan 2007 10:18:51 +0100
Paul de Vrieze <pauldv@gentoo.org> wrote:

> I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or
> later" is a license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the
> file have contents like:
> "This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for the
> GPL."

This is effectively what Diego was proposing with the 'GPL-2+' name.

> The LICENSE would then be:
> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-RENEW"
>
> The advantage being that the renew clause is version independent, we
> don't lose information, don't have to mutilate licenses (by adding
> text). If desired it could even be used as LICENSE="|| (GPL-2 GPL-3)
> GPL-RENEW"

This isn't necessary - by creating the 'GPL-2+' license name, the only
thing that's not fully correct as things stand is that packages that
can be accepted with GPL-2 or later won't be accepted if the user has
just GPL-3 in ACCEPT_LICENSES. Over time this can be fixed, by
replacing "GPL-2" with "GPL-2+" in the LICENSE variable for the
relevant packages.

The the meaning of each license name would be strictly:

GPL-2 : Only licensed under GPL v2
GPL-3 : Only licensed under GPL v3
GPL-2+ : Licensed under GPL v2 or later

Which gives everyone what they need; those wanting GPL-2 or later would
have ACCEPT_LICENSES="GPL-2 GPL-3 GPL-2+".


For me, the only other sane alternative would be to use license groups
(assuming license groups can be specified in the LICENSE variable). I
don't recall the status of license groups in portage.

--
Kevin F. Quinn

On Thursday 04 January 2007 11:42, Kevin F. Quinn wrote:
> On Wed, 3 Jan 2007 10:18:51 +0100
>
> Paul de Vrieze <pauldv@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or
> > later" is a license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the
> > file have contents like:
> > "This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for the
> > GPL."
>
> This is effectively what Diego was proposing with the 'GPL-2+' name.

Except that a GPL-RENEW tag would be transparent over newer GPL releases too.
Upstreams will likely release under gpl-3 and newer. My solution would handle
it transparently.

Paul

--
Paul de Vrieze
Gentoo Developer
Mail: pauldv@gentoo.org
Homepage: http://www.devrieze.net

On Thu, 4 Jan 2007 12:00:51 +0100
Paul de Vrieze <pauldv@gentoo.org> wrote:

> On Thursday 04 January 2007 11:42, Kevin F. Quinn wrote:
> > On Wed, 3 Jan 2007 10:18:51 +0100
> >
> > Paul de Vrieze <pauldv@gentoo.org> wrote:
> > > I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or
> > > later" is a license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the
> > > file have contents like:
> > > "This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for
> > > the GPL."
> >
> > This is effectively what Diego was proposing with the 'GPL-2+' name.
>
> Except that a GPL-RENEW tag would be transparent over newer GPL
> releases too. Upstreams will likely release under gpl-3 and newer. My
> solution would handle it transparently.

So you're suggesting "GPL-2 GPL-RENEW" would mean "GPL-2 or later", and
"GPL-3 GPL-RENEW" would mean "GPL-3 or later"? Ugh. That'd be a mess
for portage to parse.

A better way of doing what I think you're suggesting, would be to
define (say) the suffix '+' to mean 'or later' (with defined
semantics; perhaps such that 'later' means substring that matches regex
'-[^-]+\+$' be lexicographically greater in the C locale). However
that means adding such management to portage.

I still think license groups in LICENSE would be the ideal solution
(requires changes to portage), but the most practical solution for now
is simply to create GPL-2+ as Diego suggested.

--
Kevin F. Quinn

On Thu, 4 Jan 2007 12:00:51 +0100 Paul de Vrieze <pauldv@gentoo.org>
wrote:
| Except that a GPL-RENEW tag would be transparent over newer GPL
| releases too.

But it won't be transparent for end users, who will have to accept
weird non-licences in ACCEPT_LICENCES.

--
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Web : http://ciaranm.org/
Paludis is faster : http://ciaranm.org/show_post.pl?post_id=61

Diego 'Flameeyes' Pettenò wrote:
> Comments, ideas, proposals?

currently we have all those under GPL-2. Now when GPL-3 becomes available
people have the option to use GPL-3. However that will still allow people
to use GPL-2 if their patents, etc need it. SO it is not much difference.

The big difference that actually matters is when applications start to get
distributed only for the GPL-3 and actually then I would also like to see
the LICENSE change to GPL-3.

I see little benifit in having GPL-2+ but a lot of potential confusion and a
lot of work for developers to check all pkges.

- Stefan

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Paul de Vrieze wrote:
> I know that I'm a bit late on this, but to me the "version 2 or later" is
> a license by itself. Let's call it GPL-RENEW and let the file have
> contents like:
> "This package is licensed with the version x or later clause for the GPL."
>
> The LICENSE would then be:
> LICENSE="GPL-2 GPL-RENEW"
>
> The advantage being that the renew clause is version independent, we don't
> lose information, don't have to mutilate licenses (by adding text). If
> desired it could even be used as LICENSE="|| (GPL-2 GPL-3) GPL-RENEW"
>
That last bit's excessive IMO. It seems to add complexity- does it mean you
can have either of the GPL2 or 3 plus any later from that version? Why not
just cover that with your first example, which I like a lot- it spells out
the later clause, and as you say, is version-independent.

So GPL-3 GPL-RENEW could be specified, as well as simple GPL-2, or GPL-2
GPL-RENEW. (Just spelling it out, sorry.)

I'm thinking about your example and I can see how it covers a user who
*wants* to use GPL-3 (eg for their own code) but I still think that comes
under GPL-2 GPL-RENEW as it's clearly allowed.


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Paul de Vrieze wrote:
> My idea for the second way is basically to make the life of tools easier.
> It would make explicit that someone accepting GPL-3, but not GPL-2 would
> be able to accept a GPL-2 and later license.
>
Ah, I see what I'm missing- you're saying a tool could just check for the
specific license. I dunno, though, my inclination is that it'd be better
just to build a slightly smarter tool in the first place.

GPL-RENEW is the codification of the `or any later version' phrase, and is
effectively unlimited (as is the phrase), agreed? So when another license
came in, we'd have to add, say, GPL-4 to all those pkgs with GPL-RENEW in
them just to make it easier for the tools, which we could have built smart
in the first place. That sounds like too much of a maintenance hassle to
me, as well as making the ebuilds (slightly) larger across the board.

But that was a minor point- the idea of GPL-RENEW is sound IMO.


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Having read the other thread, I have to agree that the N+ approach is
better, as you could have GPL3+ as well with simple parsing.


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Diego 'Flameeyes' Petten wrote:
> What I propose is to copy licenses/GPL-2 to license/GPL-2+ and adding the
> following notes at the start of the two files:
>
> GPL-2:
> Note: this license states that the software is licensed under GNU General
> Public License version 2, and you might not be able to consider it licensed
> under any later version.
>
> GPL-2+:
> Note: this license explicitly allows licensing under GNU General Public
> License version 2 or, at your option, any later version.

Was there ever a consensus on this? I think it's an important issue and
am willing to help with an audit.


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