On Wed, 2008-05-14 at 08:14 -0400, Ales Hvezda wrote:
> Hi Stuart,
>
> [snip]
> >As long as we're discussing licensing stuff, I was wondering: Are you
> >interested in moving gEDA from GPL v2 to GPL v3? Or do you prefer to
> >stay at v2?
> >
>
> Eventually we are going to have to move to v3.
>
> http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#AllCompatibility
>
> See the table and observe that we are going to have to upgarde if
> we start using gplv3 libraries. Footnote 3 is most interesting.
I guess we should cross that bridge when we come to it, rather than
making it a specific release goal.
I'm also not clear where the violation would happen, if (say) GTK moved
to GPL V3. (IIRC, they already decided they wouldn't for 2.x).
Presumably it would occur when the distro's distributed binaries which
linked against a GPLv3 library. (AAUI, A private user compiling the code
would not, unless distributing the resulting binary).
BUT.. since gEDA is GPL V2 or later, would linking against a GPL3
library just mean that this particular copy was conveyed under GPLV3,
without a licence violation? Would the distro have to edit the sources
they distribute for that binary to say GPLv3 or above?
I guess this is what footnote 3 is getting at, but it isn't clear.. "if
you upgrade to GPLv3". "you" might not necessarily mean us, it could be
anyone who distributes binary compiled from our sources which links
against a GPLv3 library.
Gah, licensing makes my head hurt!
I think we are in agreement about our license goals:
Allow anyone to use our software, _including_ for commercial benefit
Keep the software free: source code available, users can do with it (mostly)
what they want.
Stop anyone adding features and passing them out without corresponding
source-code.
(Allow anyone to _sell_ our software, so long as the above conditions are met
-
IE.. the new code remains open to those who receive it.).
I suspect the "tivo" additions to GPLv3 don't really apply to our kind of
software.
I'm not really sure about the patent aspects, but can't see how they are
of much immediate use to us. I guess it would perhaps protect us if
someone added code they owned a patent for, or if someone distributing
our software did own patents which we infringed. However, I'm unsure
whether either of these are likely cases for gEDA.
A more likely scenario would be accidental infringement of someone
else's patent, but no license can exonerate responsibility for that.
Best regards,
--
Peter Clifton
Electrical Engineering Division,
Engineering Department,
University of Cambridge,
9, JJ Thomson Avenue,
Cambridge
CB3 0FA
Tel: +44 (0)7729 980173 - (No signal in the lab!)
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