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Re: CVS commit: pkgsrc/pkgtools/pkg_install/files/lib



Alistair Crooks <agc%pkgsrc.org@localhost> writes:

> On Sat, Nov 26, 2011 at 08:21:08PM -0500, Greg Troxel wrote:
>> But, if you object to this, then I think you're really objecting to the
>> above policy -- which is a reasonable discussion to have, separate from
>> whether agpl is properly added to the default list under the current
>> documented policy.
>
> Yes, the objection is to the current policy - we should not just be
> rubber-stamping FSF licenses, since their licensing requirements are
> different to TNF's - principally more stringent and onerous.

So do you object to all copyleft licenses being in
DEFAULT_ACCEPTABLE_LICENSES?

> We see a number of companies who will not use GPLv3 or LGPLv3 software.
>
> We see a number of BSD projects which will not include GPLv3 or LGPLv3
> software.
>
> Both of these decisions have been taken following legal advice.
>
> I think we should respect the wishes of those entities, and remove
> GPLv3 and LGPLv3 from the current list, and also remove AGPLv3 too.

(Ryo ONODERA makes good points about GPL3 code in NetBSD base:
  ~/NetBSD-current/src/external/gpl3 > ls -l
  total 14
  drwxr-xr-x  2 gdt  users   512 Nov  1 05:49 CVS
  -r--r--r--  1 gdt  users   311 Nov  1 05:49 Makefile
  -r--r--r--  1 gdt  users  3130 Apr  1  2010 README
  drwxr-xr-x  7 gdt  users   512 Nov 13  2009 binutils
  drwxr-xr-x  6 gdt  users   512 Jul 19 07:58 gcc
  drwxr-xr-x  6 gdt  users   512 Oct 19 11:32 gdb
)

Can you point to a published documented license policy by TNF that
excludes GPL3?  I didn't find it linked from:

  http://www.netbsd.org/about/redistribution.html

We are not talking about inclusion in the base system.  We are simply
talking about installing packages.  So I think there's a much lower bar,
and excluding licenses from DEFAULT_ACCEPTABLE_LICENSES that are present
in base system code does not make sense to me.

As I've said before, anyone who is going to take software from pkgsrc,
make a derived work, and distribute it or serve it over a network needs
to talk to counsel.   So the whole ACCEPTABLE_LICENSES situation is
about people who are not doing something that causes them to need
counsel.


If there are people with a no-GPL3 policy, then perhaps we need a
variable

GPL3_ACCEPTABLE?= yes

which if set to no changes the default for DEFAULT_ACCEPTABLE_LICENSES.
That would certainly enable places with a "free software ok, but not
GPL3" policy to adapt pkgsrc very easily.

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