[Bug #2000] Change the license to "GPLv2+ or Ruby's original"

Mamoru_T · August 26, 2009, 5:16pm

Bug #2000: Change the license to “GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original”.
http://redmine.ruby-lang.org/issues/show/2000

e$B5/I<<Te(B: Mamoru T.
e$B%9%F!<%?%9e(B: Open, e$BM%@hEYe(B: High
ruby -v: 1.8.x/1.9.x

Hello.

Recently readline 6.0 was released and its license was changed from
GPLv2+ (GPL version 2 and any later) to GPLv3+ [1][2]
Unfortunately Ruby’s license is still under GPLv2 and Ruby’s original
license [3],
which is incompatible with GPLv3 [4]. So unless Ruby’s license is
changed
to “GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original license” or so , Ruby’s readline module
cannot be shipped
any more. Note that “Ruby’s original license” is regarded as
incompatible with
GPL [5].

So please change the Ruby’s license to GPLv3 (and GPLv2) compat.

[1] The GNU Readline Library
[2]
readline update?
[3] http://svn.ruby-lang.org/cgi-bin/viewvc.cgi/trunk/COPYING?view=co
[4] License Approval :: Fedora Docs
[5] License Approval :: Fedora Docs

Mamoru_T · August 26, 2009, 5:21pm

Hi,

I guess this post might be better to go ruby-core.

In message “Re: [ruby-dev:39167] [Bug #2000] Change the license to
“GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original”.”
on Wed, 26 Aug 2009 23:47:10 +0900, Mamoru T.
[email protected] writes:

|Recently readline 6.0 was released and its license was changed from
|GPLv2+ (GPL version 2 and any later) to GPLv3+ [1][2]
|Unfortunately Ruby’s license is still under GPLv2 and Ruby’s original license [3],
|which is incompatible with GPLv3 [4]. So unless Ruby’s license is changed
|to “GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original license” or so , Ruby’s readline module cannot be shipped
|any more. Note that “Ruby’s original license” is regarded as incompatible with
|GPL [5].
|
|So please change the Ruby’s license to GPLv3 (and GPLv2) compat.

I am not sure how Fedra project think, but there’s no such thing as
Ruby’s license independent from GPL. It’s always dual licensed, so as
a whole it’s always GPL compatible (at least to GPLv2). It’s already
known to FSF, see the compatibility note from them (I don’t remember
the URL right now).

For license compatibility issue, I think we are still able to ship
readline extension without changing Ruby’s license as a whole, since
the older version of readline library is always available. But to
avoid the potential problem, we should either, a) note that it’s
incompatible with GPLv3 version of libreadline, or b) note that
readline extension can be distributed by GPLv3 as well (triple
license).

I recommend the latter.

Compatibility issues between free software licenses suck.

          matz.

Mamoru_T · August 26, 2009, 5:25pm

In message [email protected]
on Wed, 26 Aug 2009 23:47:10 +0900,
Mamoru T. [email protected] wrote:

GPLv2+ (GPL version 2 and any later) to GPLv3+ [1][2]
Unfortunately Ruby’s license is still under GPLv2 and Ruby’s original license [3],
which is incompatible with GPLv3 [4]. So unless Ruby’s license is changed
to “GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original license” or so , Ruby’s readline module cannot be shipped
any more. Note that “Ruby’s original license” is regarded as incompatible with
GPL [5].

So please change the Ruby’s license to GPLv3 (and GPLv2) compat.
Another option is make Ruby use older readline library which was GPLv2
strictly.

And you need to know, Ruby’s readline module work not only with GNU
readline but also editline library (contained in *BSD). So, importing
editline library is another option.

Mamoru_T · August 26, 2009, 6:51pm

e$B%A%1%C%He(B #2000 e$B$,99?7$5$l$^$7$?!#e(B (by Shyouhei U.)

e$BM%@hEYe(B Highe$B$+$ie(BNormale$B$KJQ99e(B

Moved to feature category because this is not a bug definitely.

http://redmine.ruby-lang.org/issues/show/2000

Mamoru_T · August 27, 2009, 2:22am

Hi,

At Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:20:03 +0900,
Takahiro K. wrote in [ruby-dev:39169]:

So please change the Ruby’s license to GPLv3 (and GPLv2) compat.
Another option is make Ruby use older readline library which was GPLv2
strictly.

A patch followed.

And you need to know, Ruby’s readline module work not only with GNU
readline but also editline library (contained in *BSD). So, importing
editline library is another option.

However, editline’s compatibility is still incomplete a little.
I found it lacks rl_getc declaration and the type of
rl_getc_function differs from GNU readline’s one.

Index: ext/readline/extconf.rb

— ext/readline/extconf.rb (revision 24680)
+++ ext/readline/extconf.rb (working copy)
@@ -4,5 +4,5 @@ $readline_headers = [“stdio.h”]

def have_readline_header(header)

if have_header(header)

if have_header(header, &$readline_extra_check)
$readline_headers.push(header)
return true
@@ -25,4 +25,10 @@ dir_config(‘termcap’)
dir_config(“readline”)
enable_libedit = enable_config(“libedit”)
+$readline_extra_check = (proc {|src| src << <<EOS} unless
enable_config(“readline-v6”))
+#if RL_VERSION_MAJOR >= 6
+#error GPLv2 incompatible
+#endif
+EOS

have_library(“user32”, nil) if /cygwin/ === RUBY_PLATFORM
have_library(“ncurses”, “tgetnum”) ||

Mamoru_T · August 27, 2009, 7:22am

2009/08/27 0:13, Yukihiro M. wrote:

I am not sure how Fedra project think, but there’s no such thing as
Ruby’s license independent from GPL. It’s always dual licensed, so as
a whole it’s always GPL compatible (at least to GPLv2). It’s already
known to FSF, see the compatibility note from them (I don’t remember
the URL right now).

I interpretd this paragraph says,
Ruby’s License is alyways GPLv2 compat.

b) note that
readline extension can be distributed by GPLv3 as well (triple
license).

If the readline is GPLv3 and readline extension is linked to it,
the extension must be GPLv3 compat.
If the readline extension is GPLv3 and the extension is linked to Ruby,
Ruby must be GPLv3 compat.

b) is not acceptable.

Mamoru_T · August 26, 2009, 5:30pm

Hi,

In message “Re: [ruby-dev:39168] Re: [Bug #2000] Change the license to
“GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original”.”
on Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:13:31 +0900, Yukihiro M.
[email protected] writes:

|It’s already
|known to FSF, see the compatibility note from them (I don’t remember
|the URL right now).

It’s
http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/index_html#GPLCompatibleLicenses.
And it says:

License of Ruby

This is a free software license, compatible with the GPL
via an explicit dual-licensing clause.

          matz.

Mamoru_T · August 27, 2009, 7:28am

2009/08/27 9:21, Nobuyoshi N. wrote:

At Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:20:03 +0900,
Takahiro K. wrote in [ruby-dev:39169]:

And you need to know, Ruby’s readline module work not only with GNU
readline but also editline library (contained in *BSD). So, importing
editline library is another option.

However, editline’s compatibility is still incomplete a little.
I found it lacks rl_getc declaration and the type of
rl_getc_function differs from GNU readline’s one.

I know knu said this as joke but for readers,
edtline (libedit) does not support multibytes.
So this can’t be an acceptable option.

Mamoru_T · August 27, 2009, 12:19pm

Hi,

In message “Re: [ruby-dev:39175] Re: [Bug #2000] Change the license to
“GPLv2+ or Ruby’s original”.”
on Thu, 27 Aug 2009 14:22:44 +0900, “NARUSE, Yui”
[email protected] writes:

If it’s true, life sucks. I hate licensing issues. So we have two
GPL software, both respecting the spirit of free software, but still
we have license problem. ****.

We have to someone to make clear what would happen if we change the
whole license to GPLv2+, or other work around. I am not going to add
an option to reject GPLv3 to readline, since most people don’t add the
option, and would violate GPLv3 without knowing. That’s dishonest.

We really should go to ruby-core.

          matz.

Mamoru_T · August 28, 2009, 1:18pm

e$B%A%1%C%He(B #2000 e$B$,99?7$5$l$^$7$?!#e(B (by Mamoru T.)

Ah, I thought that I was already subscribing to this bug ticket.

The problem is:

|Ruby must be GPLv3 compat.
|
|b) is not acceptable.

If it’s true, life sucks. I hate licensing issues. So we have two
GPL software, both respecting the spirit of free software, but still
we have license problem. ****.

This is exactly true and if we use readline 6 and make ruby’s
readline.so
linked against both libreadline.so and libruby.so, ruby “itself” (not
ruby’s
readline module only) must be GPLv3 compat , so b) is not the option.
(By the way on Fedora not all softwares using readline have switched to
GPLv3
compat license, so currently Fedora ships both readline 6 and readline
5)

Well, the license issue is always really annoying , however I hope this
issue
is resolved somehow.

http://redmine.ruby-lang.org/issues/show/2000

Mamoru_T · September 2, 2009, 9:46am

e$B%A%1%C%He(B #2000 e$B$,99?7$5$l$^$7$?!#e(B (by Takahiro K.)

We really should go to ruby-core.
Agree. Then how will this ticket be handled or someone change this
ticket to ruby-core?
(I don’t know how tickets are processed.)

I don’t think that it is good idea to leave this ticket open.

http://redmine.ruby-lang.org/issues/show/2000