Re: Software Licenced Under a Specific Version of GPL
On 20010830T141556-0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> Yes, it would, since we would be violating the terms of the
> packages that do _not_ want later versions; and if people in charge
> of policy when GPL v3 comes out do not take care of this, they shall
> be screwing up.
Actually, I think the screwup has already been done: we don't specify
which version of GPL the common-licenses file contains. Whatever we
do to fix that, it breaks something (letting the GPL file be version 2 always
breaks aesthetics. which is minor breakage but breakage nonetheless).
> I, however, have full faith in our succesors, and I am not
> going to assume they shall just follow the masses and the hell with
> the details philosophy.
I am cynical: I don't expect our successors to be any better than we are now.
We make mistakes, they will make mistakes. In my experience, this
philosophy is quite useful in software development.
Anyway, we are straying from the point.
> Antti-Juhani> I don't think so - look at what we did to LGPL.
>
> Point taken. We4 did screw up, unless someone already has
> taken steps to look at the LGPL licences and fix all those who did
> not want later versions. Are you sure this step was not taken?
No I don't, but I cannot recall any steps having been taken at that time.
Quick grepping did not find any packages that are broken in this way
(but lots of packages that, for example, neglect to specify a version
at all).
> Can
> you point me to any instances where the symlink causes us to mis
> represent any package?
Not at this time; but I'm leaving for a work-related trip in fifteen minutes,
and do not have the time to do a comprehensive search. I'll return to this
on Monday.
> If they do what Ari fears, it shall be a screw up -- we
> should not mis represent licenses, and we should not point people to
> licenses that do not conform to what the upstream author intends the
> license to be. Are you implying that sdhall not be a screw up?
No. It seems I wrote complete gibberish there :-)
> Please file a wish list bug against the relevant package.
The policy group does not have objections to using that symlink
if it is created? (Note that policy only refers to GPL and LGPL,
not to GPL-2 or LGPL-2.)
--
%%% Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho % gaia@iki.fi % http://www.iki.fi/gaia/ %%%
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