From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 From: Arnout Vandecappelle Date: Wed, 10 Feb 2016 23:35:22 +0100 Subject: [Buildroot] [PATCH v2 3/5] COPYING: add exception about patch licensing In-Reply-To: <20160203230208.GB3428@free.fr> References: <1454365196-26319-1-git-send-email-luca@lucaceresoli.net> <1454365196-26319-4-git-send-email-luca@lucaceresoli.net> <20160203230208.GB3428@free.fr> Message-ID: <56BBBB2A.1060706@mind.be> List-Id: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit To: buildroot@busybox.net On 04-02-16 00:02, Yann E. MORIN wrote: > Luca, All, > > On 2016-02-01 23:19 +0100, Luca Ceresoli spake thusly: >> > Several people have been asking what is the license of the patches >> > provided by Buildroot. COPYING is the authoritative place to state it. >> > >> > Signed-off-by: Luca Ceresoli >> > Cc: Thomas Petazzoni >> > Cc: Arnout Vandecappelle >> > --- >> > Changes v1 -> v2: >> > - Rewrite it almost entirely (Arnout, Thomas). >> > --- >> > COPYING | 8 ++++++++ >> > 1 file changed, 8 insertions(+) >> > >> > diff --git a/COPYING b/COPYING >> > index d511905..3596777 100644 >> > --- a/COPYING >> > +++ b/COPYING >> > @@ -1,3 +1,11 @@ >> > +Except for the patches provided for packages, Buildroot is licensed >> > +under the GNU General Public License, version 2. > There a gotcha here. The manual states, in chapter 12.3: > > Buildroot [is] released under the GNU General Public License, > version 2 or (at your option) any later version. > > So, we have to clarify: is it GPLv2 or GPLV2+ ? > > It's too late today for me to go digging; I'll do that tomorrow. Just > rmind me before the end of the week if there's not feedback from my part > on this topic. Reminder :-) But I did the digging. The situation is of course complicated. We don't have many files that specify a license by themselves. All of them specify 'or later', except for makedevs.c (obviously, because it is copied from busybox), toolchain-wrapper.c (added by Peter in 2011), and the manual itself, which specify v2 only. The top-level Makefile is the only thing of which you could say that it has project-wide scope. And that says 'or later'. So, what does that mean for buildroot as a whole? I think it is GPLv2+, except for the package patches and except for the files that explicitly specify a different license. Can we fit that in the formulation that evolved in this thread? Regards, Arnout > > Until then, NAK. > -- Arnout Vandecappelle arnout at mind be Senior Embedded Software Architect +32-16-286500 Essensium/Mind http://www.mind.be G.Geenslaan 9, 3001 Leuven, Belgium BE 872 984 063 RPR Leuven LinkedIn profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/arnoutvandecappelle GPG fingerprint: 7493 020B C7E3 8618 8DEC 222C 82EB F404 F9AC 0DDF