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
_______________________________________________
Gnu-arch-users mailing list
Gnu-arch-users gnu.org
http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/gnu-arch-users
GNU arch home page:
http://sav
annah.gnu.org/projects/gnu-arch/
|
