[ClusterLabs Developers] [booth][sbd] GPLv2.1+ clarification request

[Andrew Beekhof]

Agree completely 

Sent from a mobile device 

> On 19 Mar 2016, at 2:16 AM, Lars Ellenberg <lars.ellenberg at linbit.com> wrote:
> 
>> On Thu, Mar 17, 2016 at 07:12:19PM +0100, Dejan Muhamedagic wrote:
>> Hi Jan,
>> 
>>> On Thu, Mar 17, 2016 at 06:47:37PM +0100, Jan Pokorný wrote:
>>> Hello all,
>>> 
>>> during latest reviews of packages building on core cluster
>>> infrastructure, it turned out there is a frequented (viral?) issue
>>> with source files declaring unusual licence: GPLv2.1+.
>> 
>> Yes, I'd say that it's all coming from a single source. I suspect
>> that nobody's looking at the license, just copies another source
>> file from the same project. Anyway, that's what I did in booth.
>> 
>> Who created the first file with this non-existent license is
>> anybody's guess. It could probably be traced, but I doubt that
>> it'd help in any way.
> 
> Actually it might.
> 
> I think that what happened was this:
> 
> in the early days of heartbeat, way back when,
> source code got "batch tagged" with the license statement:
> http://hg.linux-ha.org/heartbeat-STABLE_3_0/rev/4a67fde00b0b#l1.10
> 2000/07/26 05:17:18
> 
> Most stuff got tagged with the LGPL 2.1.
> 
> Some time later, someone noticed that in some cases,
> a "program" is not a "library", and tried to re-tag
> e.g. "api_test.c" with the GPL 2,
> but without properly taking the actual suggested GPL 2 stanza,
> but by simply dropping "Lesser" and changing "library" to "software".
> http://hg.linux-ha.org/heartbeat-STABLE_3_0/rev/bc508513c4dc#l2.10
> 2000/08/31 05:23:36
> 
> :-(
> 
> Both changes predate the GPLv3 by seven years.
> 
> From there it propagated to ipfail.c and attrd.c, which both became
> *the* template files to start from when writing daemons and extensions
> using the API.
> 
> Developers quickly browse their "template",
> their "auto-correct" filter reads "GPL 2",
> which they are content with,
> and in good faith they hack away.
> 
> I think it is safe to assume that any developer copying from there meant
> to "stay in project" regarding the licensing.
> 
> So I move to change it to GPLv2+, for everything that is a "program",
> and LGPLv2.1 for everything that may be viewed as a libraray.
> 
> At least that's how I will correct the wording in the
> affected files in the heartbeat mercurial.
> 
> -- 
> : Lars Ellenberg
> : LINBIT | Keeping the Digital World Running
> : DRBD -- Heartbeat -- Corosync -- Pacemaker
> : R&D, Integration, Ops, Consulting, Support
> 
> DRBD® and LINBIT® are registered trademarks of LINBIT
> 
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