Guidelines and HOWTOs/Relicensing/KDE Relicensing: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 17:01, 25 January 2009

KDE GPL v2.0 Relicensing effort

Why does it matter?

A couple of KDE dependent projects or even libraries have moved or are going to move to GPLv3 (State of GPLv3 movement).

Unfortunately, GPL v3 is incompatible with GPL v2. This means that it is not possible to create a project linking GPL v2 and v3 code together. There is no problem for projects which are licensed GPLv2+ (version 2 or above).

A few parts of KDE are currently licensed as GPLv2 only. So far we have no reason to believe that this was something other than an oversight. However, we still need to validate with the individual copyright holders that a relicense to GPLv2+ or GPLv2+v3 is okay with them.

Therefore, in an effort we're trying to identify the contributors that have contributed under the terms of GPLv2 and where the "+" part was not explicitly mentioned. If we know that all contributors agreed to a relicense, we can go ahead and flip the license of the individual source file.

How can I help?

By identifying a contributor who as contributed under the terms of GPLv2 (use kdesdk/scripts/relicensecheck.pl on the file in question or the Relicense Status Page), and contacting him if he wasn't already contacted. Ask him the following questions:

Are you okay with relicensing your contributions done under GPLv2 to GPLv2+?

Are you okay with relicensing your contributions done under GPLv2 to GPLv2 or GPLv3 ?

Are you okay with relicensing your contributions done under LGPLv2 to LGPLv2+?

Are you okay with relicensing your contributions done under LGPLv2 to LGPLv2 or LGPLv3?

Are you okay with the KDE e.V. deciding on a future licensing change to your code, should that be necessary?

What's next?

you checkout relicensecheck.pl from trunk/KDE/kdesdk/scripts
you run it on the file or directory in question
you interpret the result. check each commit that is being complained about carefully. Try to get the copyright's holder's permission. If you get it, update the whitelist in the script.
review the list of declared copyright holders in the file.
if you're all clear, change the license to the most liberal license possible. Document your change verbosely in the SVN commit log.

Current Reply List

Please keep the list sorted by family name!
Please only use "YES" or "NO"

Name	GPLv2->GPLv2+	LGPLv2 -> LGPLv2+	GPLv2 -> GPLv2+v3	LGPLv2 -> LGPLv2+LGPLv3	KDE e.V. decides
Adam, Till	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Allen, Danny	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Alsina, Roberto	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Armitage, Chani	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Bastian, Waldo	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Berger, Cyrille	NO	NO	NO	NO	NO
Boemann, Casper	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Broadstone, Matt	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Codrea, Vlad	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Connell, Charles	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Cullmann, Christoph	NO	NO	YES	YES	NO
Drummond, Craig	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Dymo, Alexander	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Edghill, Gregg	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Faure, David	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Fernández, Rafael	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Granroth, Kurt	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Harris, Jason	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Haumann, Dominik	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Hausmann, Simon	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Hoeglund, Fredrik	NO	NO	YES	YES
Howell, Michael	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Huerlimann, Simon	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Kainhofer, Reinhold	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Kellet, Alexander	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Kloecker, Ingo	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Knight, Robert	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Koenig, Tobias	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Kretz, Matthias	NO	NO	YES	YES	NO
Kulow, Stephan	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Lee, Chris	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Lunak, Lubos	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Mac-Vicar, Duncan	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Macieira, Thiago	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Mantia, Andras	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Martyn, Greg	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
McGuire, Thomas	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Molkentin, Daniel	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Montel, Laurent	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Moore, Richard	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Mueller, Dirk	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Mutz, Marc	YES	YES	NO	NO	NO
Ottens, Kevin	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Pignet, Eric	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Pyne, Michael	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Raabe, Frerich	NO	NO	YES	YES	NO
Rahn, Torsten	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES
Riddell, Jonathan	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Sand, Espen	YES	YES			YES
Sanders, Don	YES	YES	YES	YES	No
Sauer, Sebastian	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Schlaeger, Chris	NO	NO	YES	YES	NO
Schmeisser, Simon	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Schumacher, Cornelius	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Seigo, Aaron	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Soeken, Mathias	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO
Stephenson, Will	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Tapsell, John	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Toscano, Pino	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Treat, Adam	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Trueg, Sebastian (Exception: K3b)	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Ventura-Whiting, Ian	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Wallin, Inge	YES	YES	YES	YES
Williams, Matt	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Wolfer, Urs	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Yrvin, Knut	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
Zachmann, Thorsten	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO

Current TODO List

KDAB
Matthew Woehlke
Daniel Teske
Dawit Alemayehu
Alex Zepeda
Thomas Leitner
Lars Knoll
Maksim Orlovich
Sirtaj Singh Kang
Karol Szwed
Thorsten Roeder
Joseph Wenninger

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
 == KDE GPL v2.0 Relicensing effort ==
-=== Why does it matter ? ===
+=== Why does it matter? ===
 A couple of KDE dependent projects or even libraries have moved or are going to move to GPLv3 ([http://gpl3.palamida.com:8080/ State of GPLv3 movement]).
@@ Line 11: / Line 11: @@
 Therefore, in an effort we're trying to identify the contributors that have contributed under the terms of GPLv2 and where the "+" part was not explicitly mentioned. If we know that all contributors agreed to a relicense, we can go ahead and flip the license of the individual source file.
-== How can I help ? ==
+== How can I help? ==
 By identifying a contributor who as contributed under the terms of GPLv2 (use '''kdesdk/scripts/relicensecheck.pl''' on the file in question or the [http://toma.kovoks.nl/kde/ Relicense Status Page]), and contacting him if he wasn't already contacted. Ask him the following questions: