Re: Linux and GPLv2

[Måns Rullgård <mru@inprovide.com>]

Humberto Massa <humberto.massa@almg.gov.br> writes:

> Arnoud Engelfriet wrote:
>
>>Interesting point. But the statement would apply certainly to
>>Linus' own contributions. And that would preclude distribution
>>of anything containing those contributions under anything but GPLv2
>>I think. But if you can take out his code (and any other that's
>>GPLv2 only), you'd be free to apply GPLv3 if and when it comes out.
>>
>>Arnoud
>>
>>
> Sorry, but no, no, no.
>
> Everything that is not completely independent and extractable and beyond
> any doubt non-historically-derived of Linus code is a derivative work
> and, as such, can only be distributed under the terms of the GPLv2.
>
> To prove something not derivative, you would have to show that
> historically, it was made for other kernel, and that there is no
> tranformation of the linux kernel that resulted in that something. There
> *is* at least one example in the tree: the ppp code is derivative from
> one of the BSDs.

Some of the filesystems (XFS and JFS, at least) have external origins,
although they must have been somewhat adapted to the Linux VFS layer.

-- 
Måns Rullgård
mru@inprovide.com