Re: XEmacs copyright
On 8/17/07, Stephen J. Turnbull <stephen(a)xemacs.org> wrote:
SL Baur writes:
> Our core source code is derived from Lucid Emacs which predated GPL
> v2. I don't think it's legally clear to anyone (beyond the fact
> that we're 100% GPL) what version of the GPL we are.
Well, I won't impose my view on anybody else, but I've synched GPLv2
code into XEmacs, so IMHO our immune system is v2 at best.
If you want GPLv1 code, of course you can dig into our archives and
get it from there. But code released as "v2 or later" is indeed not
v1 IMHO.
I don't, but there used to be lots of stuff marked GPL v1 (or later)
with authorship attributed to Lucid and Sun.
> Martin changed a lot of the files you're looking at
without
> permission of the authors, so ask him if it was legal.
If it's from "v1 or later" to "v2 or later", he indeed did have
the
permission of the authors IMHO. If it's Weenie code, of course Bob is
sufficiently a dick to have changed back to "v1 or not at all" in some
cases (but I don't think any of that is in XEmacs proper). I can't
imagine anybody else lacks so much clue, though.
He might have added "or later" too. Do we still have XEmacs 19.14
and earlier in CVS? I'm curious now.
All of the relevant Infodock code, *I* merged with Bob's permission
and xemacs-review approval. There wasn't much in the way of
core code. But that had to have been under terms of at least
GPL v2.
Do note that our splash screen still says Copyright (c) _1990_-
1994 Lucid, Inc. and Lucid is dead, dead, dead and a 1990
copyright absolutely means pre GPL v2.
> Just part of the reason Stallman has waged war on us.
Unlikely. I have my differences with Stallman, but this is not the
kind of thing he gets peeved about.
Not to me. We cannot copyright assign XEmacs to the FSF because
we cannot get the consent of all the authors of XEmacs to do the
assignment (or any other kind of legal license change). "Do you
understand why I must wage war against XEmacs because of this?"
I only had one telephone conversation with him ten years ago, but
it still burns my ass.
-sb
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