Re: [PATCH 4/5] Net: ath5k, license is GPLv2
From: Jarek Poplawski <hidden>
Date: 2007-08-30 08:25:43
Also in:
linux-wireless, lkml
On 29-08-2007 21:37, Michael Buesch wrote:
On Wednesday 29 August 2007 21:33:43 Jon Smirl wrote:quoted
What if a patch spans both code that is pure GPL and code imported from BSD, how do you license it?I think it's a valid assumption, if we say that the author of the patch read the license header of a file and agreed with it. So the patch is licensed to whatever the fileheader says. And if there's none, it's licensed with the COPYING terms. If a patch author likes some other license conditions, he must explicitely add them with the patch to the file, saying that this and that part have these and those conditions. Of course they must be compatible with the original license.
I didn't track this thread from the beginning, so maybe I repeat somebody's ideas (probably like above), but IMHO: do we have to be so selfish/pedantic? Can't we sometimes 'donate' a little bit to our 'older' bsd cousins or half-brothers? I think, it could be like this: - if our changes are minor and authors of these changes don't mind the file could stay BSD licensed only; plus we ask BSD to let it be dual licensed (but no big hassle); - otherwise, we should always distinctly mark all GPL parts. Regards, Jarek P. PS: there is probably some mess with gmail addresses in this thread.