Stas Sergeev wrote:
> Eric Auer wrote:
> >> change is to allow contributing under "GPLv2 or later".
> > Did any other DOSEMU experts have a strong opinion
> > about this? Or did people not care which of the two
> > variants should be used, except for Bart who prefers
> > the old variant?
>
Eric, you can see other Eric's (Biederman) replies in the archives here:
https://www.mail-archive.com/dosemu-devel@lists.sourceforge.net/index.html#00333
I mostly agree with him, and he was involved in DOSEMU before me so knows
slightly more about that history before.
> I am not sure Bart prefers the old variant.
> It could have been a simple misunderstanding, I don't
> know how can that be classified as re-licensing. He was
> very terse.
>
Changing from "GPLv2 only" to "GPLv2 or later" is a relicensing
(alternatively all GPLv2-only code needs to be rewritten like you wrote).
As to removing clause 5 and 6, their intent was just to clarify how the
main copyright holders of DOSEMU were interpreting the GPL. I agree they
are/were not written perfectly but the idea is just the same as Linus'
kernel COPYING header of
" NOTE! This copyright does *not* cover user programs that use kernel
services by normal system calls - this is merely considered normal use
of the kernel, and does *not* fall under the heading of "derived work".
Also note that the GPL below is copyrighted by the Free Software
Foundation, but the instance of code that it refers to (the Linux
kernel) is copyrighted by me and others who actually wrote it.
Also note that the only valid version of the GPL as far as the kernel
is concerned is _this_ particular version of the license (ie v2, not
v2.2 or v3.x or whatever), unless explicitly otherwise stated.
Linus Torvalds"
IANAL but I suspect that somebody can fork the Linux kernel and remove that
text just as you can fork dosemu (or you'd become the new maintainer) and
remove that text (or I can remove that text as still maintainer, Hans wrote
me to that was ok, it's at my own legal risk of course).
In any case the intent of the old copyright holders can be traced back from
old versions in the highly unlikely case of any lawsuit just as Linus'
intent can be clearly traced back.
However nobody can relicense the kernel or DOSEMU from GPLv2 to "GPLv2 or
later" or "GPLv3" or "GPLv3 or later" without approval of all copyright
holders.
*I* as maintainer think it does not hurt to clarify that we see DOSEMU and
DOS as separate independent works and that if somebody sells DOSEMU and
MSDOS on a CD I don't consider that copyright infringement (as long as they
make DOSEMU's source available).
For others this clarification is not needed. E.g. gog.com sells old DOS
games + DOSBOX and DOSBOX does not have any text clarifying that a DOS game
does not dynamically link to DOSBOX. DOSBOX developers do not complain to
gog.com (on the contrary!).
So I am in favour of keeping our language, maybe clarify it a bit.
However, yes the development should not be thrown away of course I fully
agree, 1.4.0 is already 7 years old, how time flies! I just have two small
children + a day job in HPC where there is little time left for free time
free software development, that's the only reason for my quietness.
Bart
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