OneAndOneIs2

Mon, Jul 16, 2007

A GPL ouch

Problems with GPL versioning is already rearing its ugly head - like Linux and (IIRC) Sun's Java code, Qt - the library KDE is built on - is GPL v2 only.

That means KDE as a whole is GPL v2, and so are all its applications. So projects like Samba going to v3 creates a sudden big problem.

Unless Trolltech relicenses Qt to be v3-friendly, the KDE project as a whole might be forced to fork anything that goes to v3 and maintain a v2 version.

I'm not a huge cheerleader for the GPL v3, but the last thing anybody wants or needs is a big divide in the FOSS community. Hopefully this will get resolved without a need for major forking efforts.

Linux being v2-only isn't a real problem, as it doesn't really get directly linked to applications. Java being v2 is a bit of an issue, but Sun seems to like GPL v3 so there's always the possibility of an upgrade. I've not heard anything from Trolltech on their opinion of the new GPL.

This could be painful.. What other projects out there are v2 only?

2 comments • Categories: Omni, FOSS, In The News

Comments:

Comment from: hari [Member]

· http://hari.literaryforums.org

Won't v3 be backward-compatible with v2? Whatever the hell that means? :-p

Permalink 18/07/07 @ 05:30

Comment from: oneandoneis2 [Member] · http://geekblog.oneandoneis2.org/

Unfortunately, because the whole point of v3 was to add restrictions and make it less-permissive (i.e. to close the loopholes) it is not backwards-compatible with v2 - falling foul of the "You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein." bit..

Permalink 18/07/07 @ 09:26