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On Wed, 2004-02-18 at 10:13, CJ Kucera wrote: |
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> Yeah, I figured that livecds and GRP packages would have to stay at |
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> the 4.3 version. But I'm still a bit hazy on what would prevent a |
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> simple ebuild from living in Portage's tree. It seems to me that, |
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> among the 300+ licenses which *are* acceptable in Portage, this new |
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> one couldn't be the "worst" of them. Wasn't there some work being |
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> done to provide an "ACCEPTABLE_LICENSES" var or something? So |
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> someone not wanting to deal with the extra requirements in the |
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> new XFree license wouldn't have to worry about having it installed. |
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|
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Here's a paragraph I wrote earlier: |
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|
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"If Gentoo distributes a GPL program or driver that can build against |
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any of the XFree86-licensed sources (for example, the SDK), Gentoo |
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probably violates the GPL. If Gentoo distributes a GPL XFree86 driver |
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(for example, x11-misc/synaptics) that can load into this X server, |
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Gentoo probably violates the GPL." |
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|
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This is because the GPL requires the complete work to be licensed |
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without any additional restrictions than the GPL, and the complete work |
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would include any files the synaptics driver built against, and |
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potentially even any files in the X server the synaptics driver loads |
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into. The new license creates such restrictions in multiple files that |
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are built into the resulting X server. I haven't researched whether the |
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exact files the synaptics driver builds against are under this new |
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license, but it's quite possible that the "complete work" would be |
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considered not just those files but the complete SDK (software |
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development kit), which external drivers such as synaptics can build |
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against. |
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|
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It's not that the new license of XFree86 explicitly prevents us from |
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providing it, rather that when combined with the GPL of various external |
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drivers the results are questionable. Just settling to not provide these |
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drivers is unacceptable. |
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|
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And again, there are other issues that I mentioned in my earlier email |
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such as the closed development and so forth. This license change is more |
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significant when viewed in context of what else has been going on within |
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XFree86. I'll refer you to my old reference list and the |
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devel@×××××××.org and forum@×××××××.org archives for more information -- |
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Google for them if you can't find them. |
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|
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Thanks, |
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Donnie |
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-- |
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Donnie Berkholz |
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Desktop project co-manager, |
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Cluster project co-lead, |
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Developer Relations, |
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Gentoo Linux |