From: Alex D. <ale...@gm...> - 2004-09-21 14:24:18
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On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 13:38:15 -0400, Adam Jackson <aj...@nw...> wrote: > On Monday 20 September 2004 12:59, Jon Smirl wrote: > > On Mon, 20 Sep 2004 12:29:30 -0400, Adam Jackson <aj...@nw...> wrote: > > > License compatibility != OS compatibility, please don't conflate the two. > > > X runs on more than just Linux, and source is distributed as an > > > aggregate. If > > > > The Linux DRM driver does not run anywhere but on Linux. The GPL code > > is isolated to the Linux DRM driver. > > > > I wonder if DRM isn't GPL already by accident. DRM has been included > > in the Linux kernel under the GPL license. DRM has also accepted many > > bug patches back from the kernel people. If a fork had occurred > > between kernel and DRM it would be clear than one fork is GPL and one > > BSD. But the code never forked. Since there is only one code base and > > that code base has been released GPL via the kernel, so we may have > > inadvertently made DRM GPL. > > I would read it as "since the code never forked, we're still BSD". > > Inclusion is not conversion, in this case. All the copyright statements in > the DRM source (excluding your recent commit) specify BSD licenses. If the > bug-fixers wanted their changes to apply under the GPL they should have > indicated that by changing the copyright statement at the top of the file. > > The aggregate kernel is GPL, yes, but that doesn't mean all the components > are. ppp_deflate.c has gotten fixes from kernel people too, but it's still > BSD-licensed. I've never understood why the aggregate X (which includes some non MIT licensed code) can't have multiple licenses. The linux kernel does; other projects do. as long as it's properly labled in the code. People use X on linux. people run gnome on BSD. technically X and BSD have slightly different licenes too. Alex > > > I'd feel a whole lot better about the licensing if BSD and Linux DRM > > were split into two repositories. > > That still wouldn't address the issue of inclusion in Xorg, unless Xorg were > to only ship with the BSD DRM. And it would probably demote the BSD OSes to > fifth-class citizen status. Can't say as I'm a fan of that idea. > > > > it's really that big of a deal, ask the author of the GPL code to allow > > > you to add it to DRM under an X-friendly license. > > > > This is a waste of time. I know that some of the authors have a GPL or > > die attitude towards device driver code. > > Reimplementing code that the original author doesn't want to relicense is > nothing new under the sun (freeglut). I believe that splintering the code > base into universal and GPL versions is a bad idea, because it means any code > in the GPL version that someone wants to use in the universal version has to > be written twice - inevitably diverging the two trees and creating the sort > of cross-merge hell we're trying to get away from. > > If we're going to "waste time" like this, we might as well do it once, up > front, and be done with it. > > - ajax > > > > _______________________________________________ > xorg mailing list > xo...@fr... > http://freedesktop.org/mailman/listinfo/xorg > > > > > |