Re: [DistroKit] [PATCH] add GPL-2.0-only as a project license

[Robert Schwebel <r.schwebel@pengutronix.de>]

Hi,

On Wed, Dec 11, 2019 at 08:47:02AM +0100, Robert Schwebel wrote:
> On Wed, Dec 11, 2019 at 08:41:07AM +0100, Alexander Dahl wrote:
> > so DistroKit itself is GPLv2 only. What would that mean for my BSP if I used 
> > DistroKit as a pxtdist base layer?
> 
> In fact, that's something we'll have to take care about - that's an
> explicitly intended usecase.
> 
> Stay tuned, we'll discuss how to solve this.

I thought about it a bit more, and the solution is easy: ptxdist itself
is of course GPLv2-only as well, and so is DistroKit and your own BSP.

The ptxdist license has a clarification in its COPYING file (since at least
2003, which is the begin of the git history):

  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
  it under the terms of the GNU General Public License, version 2.

  Note: PTXdist is a build system which generates a distribution for
  embedded systems. This license does only cover the build system itself
  and doesn't affect the license of managed software in any way, even if
  it might be distributed together with the build system.

  Robert Schwebel <r.schwebel@pengutronix.de>

The clarification was modelled after the equivalent in the Linux kernel
(clarification that userspace using syscalls is intended use, not derivation)
at that time, which has nowadays been SPDXified as well:
https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/master/COPYING

You can put whatever proprietary applications you want to put into your BSP
without being affected by the GPL that way, and it is GPLv2, not v3, so there
are no restrictions for things like trusted boot. So I think putting DistroKit
under GPLv2 is no restriction to what we already have.

We should try to find a similar solution as the kernel's.

rsc
-- 
Pengutronix e.K.                           | Dipl.-Ing. Robert Schwebel  |
Steuerwalder Str. 21                       | https://www.pengutronix.de/ |
31137 Hildesheim, Germany                  | Phone: +49-5121-206917-0    |
Amtsgericht Hildesheim, HRA 2686           | Fax:   +49-5121-206917-5555 |

_______________________________________________
DistroKit mailing list
DistroKit@pengutronix.de