[Mesa-dev] [RFC PATCH] automake: add support to src/glsl/

[Jeremy Huddleston]

On Sep 28, 2011, at 23:28, Miles Bader wrote:

> 2011/9/29 Alan Coopersmith <alan.coopersmith at oracle.com>:
>>> _Why_ is the GPLv3 "not acceptable", when the GPLv2 was?
>> 
>> Note his employer, which is well known as not accepting the GPLv3,
>> possibly due to it being a mobile phone manufacturer, and the GPLv3's
>> free patent license grant not fitting well with the current mobile phone
>> environment in which every manufacturer is involved in more patent
>> infringement lawsuits & countersuits than anyone wants to consider.
> 
> Er, sure, but that brings up my second point:  the GPL restricts
> redistribution, not use, so you are not required to "accept it" to use
> GPL tools.

Again, mirroring Alan's comment.  IANAL.  I just do what the Lawyers say.  I am told not to touch GLPv3 with a 10 foot poll while I have my Apple hat on, so I go beyond that and stay 10 miles away from GPLv3 while I have my Apple hat on.

> So the original complaint, that he is "forced to accept the GPLv3 to
> use autoconf" seems a little confused.  [of course certainly it's
> possible that _I'm_ confused, or there's a subtlety I'm missing.]

From the 2.62 release notes at http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/autotools-announce/2008-04/msg00002.html:

"""
Meanwhile, several source files within the Autoconf project are under
GPLv3+, as described in COPYINGv3; these files are used for building
and installing Autoconf, but are not present in the installed
programs.  The entire Autoconf project will move to GPLv3+ when the
exception statements have been reformulated in terms of the Additional
Permissions as described in section 7 of GPLv3.
"""

That alone means no 2.62 for me while I'm doing Apple-fu.

>> Since most developers on the X & Mesa projects are doing it as part of
>> our paid employment, we are subject to the constraints of the licenses
>> our employers are willing to accept, and no amount of logic or arguments
>> from outsiders can trump company policy.
> 
> As the GPLv3 is widely used, I think this is an issue that will come
> up again, so it's worth some discussion.

It's not that simple.  We should not thrust acceptance of a new license down our users throats.  The existence of GPLv3 is what prompted Gentoo to add support to portage to allow users to block installing packages based on license.  Clearly it's not just one or two companies that are afraid of it.