guile licensing niglets

guile licensing niglets

[Neil Jerram]

I've just received some queries about Guile's licensing from the FSF
folks.  I think all of the following are just oversights, but if
anyone else has any input on them, please follow up.

> [..] under the impression that Guile had switched completely to
> LGPL to 1.8, instead of GPL + exception.
>
> However, a few files in 1.8.3 (I admit I didn't check the dev sources)
> still have the exception text.  My grep for special.exception turned up:
> libguile.h
> libguile/__scm.h
> libguile/_scm.h
> libguile/weaks.c
> srfi/srfi-39.scm
> doc/oldfmt.c

I believe these are oversights, so would propose to update the license
text in these files to LGPL.

> Also, there is a COPYING file in many of the subdirectories.  This is
> rather unusual.  One copy for the distribution would be sufficient.

I propose to remove the non-top-level ones.

> Also, the recommended name for the top-level COPYING.LIB is now
> COPYING.LESSER.

I propose to make this name change.

Any comments?

Regards,
        Neil

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Julian Graham]

Off-topic, but has there been any discussion of moving Guile to LGPLv3?


On Jan 20, 2008 4:13 PM, Neil Jerram <neil@ossau.uklinux.net> wrote:
> I've just received some queries about Guile's licensing from the FSF
> folks.  I think all of the following are just oversights, but if
> anyone else has any input on them, please follow up.
>
> > [..] under the impression that Guile had switched completely to
> > LGPL to 1.8, instead of GPL + exception.
> >
> > However, a few files in 1.8.3 (I admit I didn't check the dev sources)
> > still have the exception text.  My grep for special.exception turned up:
> > libguile.h
> > libguile/__scm.h
> > libguile/_scm.h
> > libguile/weaks.c
> > srfi/srfi-39.scm
> > doc/oldfmt.c
>
> I believe these are oversights, so would propose to update the license
> text in these files to LGPL.
>
> > Also, there is a COPYING file in many of the subdirectories.  This is
> > rather unusual.  One copy for the distribution would be sufficient.
>
> I propose to remove the non-top-level ones.
>
> > Also, the recommended name for the top-level COPYING.LIB is now
> > COPYING.LESSER.
>
> I propose to make this name change.
>
> Any comments?

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Karl Berry]

    Off-topic, but has there been any discussion of moving Guile to LGPLv3?

Not that I'm aware of, but it's a good question :).  Does anyone know if
any GPLv2-only (not GPLv2-or-later) applications use Guile?  That is the
main question.

Thanks,
Karl

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Neil Jerram]

"Julian Graham" <joolean@gmail.com> writes:

> Off-topic, but has there been any discussion of moving Guile to LGPLv3?

Unless I get pressure to do this, I'd prefer to postpone this for now.
There are other aspects of the Guile plan/roadmap/whatever that I'd
like to get a grip on first.

Philosophically/politically, I'm happy that LGPLv3 is the right move
for Guile.  Are there any practical considerations that would
encourage us to do this sooner rather than later?

Regards,
        Neil

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hi and happy new year!  ;-)

"Julian Graham" <joolean@gmail.com> writes:

> Off-topic, but has there been any discussion of moving Guile to LGPLv3?

There was a tiny thread on the topic some time ago:

  http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.lisp.guile.devel/6651/focus=6658

This message mentions "LGPLv2.5", which RMS suggested back then as a
solution for libraries that might have GPLv2-only users.  Eventually, I
lost track of it, so maybe that possibility was deemed unnecessary?
Karl?

I suppose there are few, if any, GPLv2-only users, but I don't have any
evidence.

At any rate, I agree with Neil that this can wait (probably until the
next major version?).

Thanks,
Ludovic.

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hi Neil,

Neil Jerram <neil@ossau.uklinux.net> writes:

> Any comments?

I agree with the proposed changes.

Thanks,
Ludo'.

Re: guile licensing niglets

[Neil Jerram]

ludo@gnu.org (Ludovic Courtès) writes:

> Hi Neil,
>
> Neil Jerram <neil@ossau.uklinux.net> writes:
>
>> Any comments?
>
> I agree with the proposed changes.

Thanks, Ludo.  These changes are all now in CVS (both 1.8.x and HEAD).

     Neil