GNU Arch moves to GPL v3 or later

[Thomas Lord]

Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
>  > A project (like Emacs) gets to a stage of development
>
> If you want to go there, I'd be happy to :-), but please note that I
> was not talking about the Great Fork of 1994, I was talking about the
> *present* state of affairs where XEmacs developers regularly merge code
> from Emacs with minimal effort or discussion, while Emacs developers
> generally do not consider using XEmacs code at all unless the author
> is easily available to sign an assignment.


Sure, two issues got conflated in the discussion.   That was the main
disconnect between you and Alfred (that plus some confusion about
the law) and I was commenting on some of the issues that Alfred raised
but that weren't exactly responsive to what you were saying.


> Stefan will probably put it a bit differently, as I believe he
> personally has done some reverse synching, but I'm pretty sure he will
> confirm that the legal hurdles are much lower and the amount of code
> synching much higher in the Emacs -> XEmacs direction than the reverse.
> I doubt he will deny that the legal hurdles are a big factor in
> reducing the reverse sync flow to a trickle.
>
>  

Both are long overdue for a complete rewrite, though :-)

-t



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[Alfred M. Szmidt]

    >    Wrong.  At present, Arch can incorporate Linux code, and vice
    >    versa,
    >
    > No, not at all, the license conditions for arch are _or_later_,
    > these are terms different than those for Linux, so you _CANNOT_
    > incoperate changes from Arch into Linux.  The GPL states that
    > the license terms must be the same, since they are not, the two
    > licenses are not compatible.

   You're confusing the permissions notice, which allows a disjunction of
   template licenses, with the template licenses themselves, each of
   which individually must remain unchanged.  The "or later" phrasing is
   simply a compact way to express what legally is a multiple license,
   akin to the GPL+FDL licensing recommended by the FSF for code examples
   in documentation.

You clearly do not undertstand the GPL,

       b. You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that
          in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program
          or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge
          to all third parties under the terms of this License.


`or later' is part of the license terms, much like a the clauses of
Bison that allow people to use the output in non-free software.


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[Alfred M. Szmidt]

    > Free software is about freedom.  If it was about cooperation, and
    > respecting others' goals, then we would be using a all permissive
    > license like the Modified BSD license.

   Free software is pointless if it is not distributed and modified by
   others.  I call that "cooperation".

I suppose all my own modifications are pointless...  They are not
distributed or modified by others.  And all those companies that do
inhouse development of free software.

If it was pointless to not distribute and modify free software, then
then we would have had a explicit rule that would state that one must
make all free software public.  We don't, and never will, since
privacy is important.



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[Thomas Lord]

Alfred M. Szmidt wrote:

>    You're confusing the permissions notice, which allows a disjunction of
>    template licenses, with the template licenses themselves, each of
>    which individually must remain unchanged.  The "or later" phrasing is
>    simply a compact way to express what legally is a multiple license,
>    akin to the GPL+FDL licensing recommended by the FSF for code examples
>    in documentation.
>
> You clearly do not undertstand the GPL,
>
>        b. You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that
>           in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program
>           or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge
>           to all third parties under the terms of this License.
>
>
> `or later' is part of the license terms, much like a the clauses of
> Bison that allow people to use the output in non-free software.
>  

I'm pretty sure you're wrong, Alfred but before I explain why:  can
you cite a source for that opinion?   Is there something in the FSF's
GPL FAQ, for example?

Exception clauses, as in Bison and some other programs, are modifications
to GPL itself.   They add "additional permissions" in the language
of GPLv3.   Anyone is free to remove those permissions.   If someone
distributes a modified Bison that mixes in code that doesn't have those
permissions, then they *must* remove the extra permissions (to
redistribute).
Historically, this form of extra permission was implemented separately,
on a case
by case basis.  GPLv3 directly codifies the general rules for extra
permissions, which is pretty convenient.

The "or later" language is outside of the GPL.  It is not an extra
permissions
clause injected into the GPL.   It is part of a formal legal statement that
declares which license terms apply.  You look at some file and there is a
copyright notice:

    Copyright (C) 2007 Thomas Lord

and you want to know "on what terms was this given to me?
where can I find the terms?"   The reference to the file COPYING
and the phrase "or later" tell you where you can find the terms.
The "or" in "or later" is a technical term, with a very specific meaning:

It is easy to  explain the technical meaning of "or" through an
imagined example.   Suppose that there are two free software,
copyleft licenses called LicA and LicB.   I write some original
code and give you a copy.    My copyright notices say:

     you may use the terms of LicA or LicB.

What can you do?   You can distribute the program to a third
person as just LicA or as just LicB, assuming you otherwise
satisfy the requirements of those individual licenses.   Also,
if in distributing the program, you can simultaneously satisfy
the requirements of *both* LicA *and* LicB then you *may*
distribute just as I did, under "LicA *or* LicB".   In effect,
the law looks at your act of distribution, ponders the question
"did that take place under LicA or did that count as a LicB
distribution" and arrives at the answer "the question is moot
since the act was permitted under both licenses".

A dual licensing option like "or any later version as published by..."
is an interesting problem:  how can a copyright statement refer
to terms that haven't been written yet?   How can anyone tell
what will or won't violate those later terms?   The answer is that
it doesn't matter until the later license is released -- until that
time, it doesn't apply to anything, and therefore can't be violated.
But, after, say, GPLv3 is released, the next time I want to distribute
some "GPLv2 or later" code, I have to be sure that the distribution
is permitted under GPLv3 *or else I have to remove the "or later"*.

See?

-t




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[Stephen J. Turnbull]

I now see Tom has responded in similar vein; you may find his answer
more intelligible.

Alfred M. Szmidt writes:

 > You clearly do not undertstand the GPL,

You clearly haven't thought through what you're saying.  Let me spell
it out the implications for you.

If "You may redistribute provided that you do so under the conditions
of GPLv2 or later" plus the GPL itself stating "You must cause to be
licensed under the terms of this License" is incompatible with
redistributing under "GPLv2 (only)", then *it is also incompatible
with redistributing under "GPLv3 or later" because the terms of GPLv3
are not the same as those of GPLv2*.

The interpretation that there is some abstract "GPL" whose terms are
being approximated by the versions, so that "GPLv2" and "GPLv3" are in
some sense "the same terms" is untenable, because there is nothing in
the law or the GPL that prevents GPLv4 from being the typical
Microsoft EULA.  (Well, maybe the FSF's articles of incorporation, but
in that case we can back off to a free but non-copyleft license, such
as Larry Rosen's AFL, so that clearly the terms are different.)

In other words, if your interpretation is correct, then distributing
under "GPLv2 or later" is simply a braindamaged way of proliferating
incompatible licenses.  I trust Richard and Eben not to get it *that*
wrong, as I'm sure you do, too.

 >        b. You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that
 >           in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program
 >           or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge
 >           to all third parties under the terms of this License.
 >
 > `or later' is part of the license terms, much like a the clauses of
 > Bison that allow people to use the output in non-free software.

You have to be more precise than that.  "Or later" is part of the
license terms, but is not part of "this License".  "This License"
refers to the GPL, which is a separate document include in "the
license terms" by reference.



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[Alfred M. Szmidt]

   >    You're confusing the permissions notice, which allows a
   >    disjunction of template licenses, with the template licenses
   >    themselves, each of which individually must remain unchanged.
   >    The "or later" phrasing is simply a compact way to express
   >    what legally is a multiple license, akin to the GPL+FDL
   >    licensing recommended by the FSF for code examples in
   >    documentation.
   >
   > You clearly do not undertstand the GPL,
   >
   >        b. You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that
   >           in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program
   >           or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge
   >           to all third parties under the terms of this License.
   >
   >
   > `or later' is part of the license terms, much like a the clauses of
   > Bison that allow people to use the output in non-free software.
   >  

   I'm pretty sure you're wrong, Alfred but before I explain why:  can
   you cite a source for that opinion?   Is there something in the FSF's
   GPL FAQ, for example?

Can you quote anything that states otherwise?

Instead of asking silly questions, you can simply send a mail to
license@....


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[Alfred M. Szmidt]

How about refering to license@... instead?


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