Re: GPL "or any greater version"
Raul Miller <moth@debian.org> writes:
> In my opinion the bit that says <<and "any later version",>> refers
> to later versions of the program -- in other words, what the license
> elsewhere calls works based on the Program.
That's the real misunderstanding. That very clearly refers to any
later version of the GPL, not any later version of the program.
> Now, users have to distribute the program under the same terms they
> recieved it. But those terms include both a requirement that other
> people be allowed to distribute under later versions of the GPL,
There's no such requirement.
> and a prohibition agasinst allowing other people to distribute under
> later versions of the GPL. Since the user can't satisfy both of these
> requirements, they can't distribute it at all.
That's what compatible licenses are for anyway -- if GPLv3 is a
GPLv2-compatible license (highly unlikely, I admit) then it would work fine.
> Do you see the difference I'm seeing between "GPL v2 only" and "GPL v2
> with a prohibition on later versions"?
>
> [Aside: I'm guessing that you're thinking that the second use of the word
> "version" must mean "version of the license" rather than "version of the
> program", and that the use of quotes around the phrase which contains
> the second use of the word "version" means that there is some kind of
> requirement that the quoted statement appear in statements about the
> version of the license for this option to be valid. Is that really what
> you are thinking? If so, think I can see why you're making the claims
> you've been making.]
Ah, you thought of this already. Yes, that's exactly what I think.
Now I see a lot of why you've been arguing what you have. The "any
later version" is a very clear reference to the suggested application
text, as shown in http://www.fsf.org/licenses/info/GPLv2orLater.html
-Brian
--
Brian Sniffen bts@alum.mit.edu
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