Date: Mon, 13 Jul 2009 10:26:30 -0300 From: "Carlos A. M. dos Santos" <unixmania@gmail.com> To: Henrique Almeida <hdante@gmail.com> Cc: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Help on relicensing derived code Message-ID: <e71790db0907130626q59cbab51gb948d598448e5fa2@mail.gmail.com> In-Reply-To: <c23df7cb0907130557u8f04aeera77de24335494b39@mail.gmail.com> References: <c23df7cb0907121220m45b84fc7te4d6ba2e3f556d77@mail.gmail.com> <e71790db0907122124v5acfa820na285b8c0bbf0c683@mail.gmail.com> <c23df7cb0907130557h2b6304e5g4e55190d66a16b68@mail.gmail.com> <c23df7cb0907130557u8f04aeera77de24335494b39@mail.gmail.com>
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On Mon, Jul 13, 2009 at 9:57 AM, Henrique Almeida<hdante@gmail.com> wrote:
> 2009/7/13 Carlos A. M. dos Santos <unixmania@gmail.com>:
>> On Sun, Jul 12, 2009 at 4:20 PM, Henrique Almeida<hdante@gmail.com> wrot=
e:
>>> =A0I need to write an "errno.h" with constant values used by the FreeBS=
D
>>> kernel. My project uses exclusively the 2 clause BSD license. I
>>> expected to copy those values from FreeBSD errno.h. However, FreeBSD
>>> errno.h has 3 clauses.[...]
>>
>> Do you have any particular reason to refuse the current 3-clause license=
?
>
> =A0Yes, I've decided to choose uniform licensing for the whole project.
> I think it will be better for users this way.
I still don't see the point. The advertising clause was removed ten
years ago and the remaining 3 clauses impose just a few restrictions.
> I'll try to stick with that unless completelly impossible.
You can choose any license for code owned by you. You can also
relicense BSD-licensed code, but you still must either obey the
original license or obtain written permission to change the terms
[from the original copyright owner, University of Californa and
USL/Novell, not the FreeBSD project]. Take a look at
http://www.groklaw.net/articlebasic.php?story=3D20070114093427179
> Notice that I won't relicense the original code. I only need to
> relicense the derived work (my own version of errno.h), as described
> in the copyright law section of the following link:
>
> =A0http://www.openbsd.org/policy.html
If you are writing your own version of errno.h then it is not a
derived work. In this particular case, errno.h is just a list of error
codes so you can copy/paste the numbers and mnemonics from the output
of "man 2 intro". That would be considered "compatible code", not
derived work. Please refer to the last two paragraphs of the
"Pretrial" section at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USL_v._BSDi#Pretrial
> =A0Maybe we could find a lawyer to explain that. :-/
May be you could just accept the current license and avoid the pain. ;-)
--=20
My preferred quotation of Robert Louis Stevenson is "You cannot
make an omelette without breaking eggs". Not because I like the
omelettes, but because I like the sound of eggs being broken.
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