From owner-freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.ORG Tue Jun 15 06:46:40 2010 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8E0411065673 for ; Tue, 15 Jun 2010 06:46:40 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from freebsdlists-ports@chillibear.com) Received: from mail.sundive.org (mail.sundive.org [212.13.197.214]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 4763D8FC0C for ; Tue, 15 Jun 2010 06:46:40 +0000 (UTC) Received: from 87.114.115.154.plusnet.thn-ag2.dyn.plus.net ([87.114.115.154] helo=[192.168.0.44]) by sundive.org with esmtpsa (TLSv1:DES-CBC3-SHA:168) (Exim 4.71 (FreeBSD)) (envelope-from ) id 1OOQ0r-000LfF-Jo for freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.org; Tue, 15 Jun 2010 07:52:48 +0100 User-Agent: Microsoft-Entourage/12.24.0.100205 Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2010 07:46:27 +0100 From: Eric To: "freebsd-ports@FreeBSD.org" Message-ID: Thread-Topic: License Framework: Develop Best Practices Thread-Index: AcsMVnpfDf2xaNF1P0+y7yczDUjcDQ== In-Reply-To: <4C16DF5C.60200@p6m7g8.com> Mime-version: 1.0 Content-type: text/plain; charset="ISO-8859-1" Content-transfer-encoding: quoted-printable X-SA-Exim-Connect-IP: 87.114.115.154 X-SA-Exim-Mail-From: freebsdlists-ports@chillibear.com X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.3.1 (2010-03-16) on sun.sundive.org X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-2.2 required=5.0 tests=ALL_TRUSTED,BAYES_00, TVD_RCVD_IP autolearn=ham version=3.3.1 X-SA-Exim-Version: 4.2 X-SA-Exim-Scanned: Yes (on sundive.org) X-bounce-key: sundive.org-1; freebsdlists-ports@chillibear.com; 1276584770; 4dd3e905; Cc: Subject: Re: License Framework: Develop Best Practices X-BeenThere: freebsd-ports@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Porting software to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2010 06:46:40 -0000 > From: "Philip M. Gollucci" > Date: Tue, 15 Jun 2010 02:03:08 +0000 >=20 > On 06/15/10 00:46, Marco Br=F6der wrote: >> I find it especially important to have a expression for 'version X or an= y >> later version' (for example 'LGPLv2+'), since the following dummy exampl= e is >> not adequate: > A very good idea, but not neccessarily the best one. Future versions of > licenses are not always backwards compatible? Its GPLv2 vs GPLv3 one > such example ? Although does it matter in those cases about backwards compatibility? If the software has been released under (for example) "GPLv2 or higher" then hasn't the author essentially already consented to any future version of th= e GPL, no matter how incompatible they may be? If however they re-release software under later licences (dual or otherwise= ) then that's explicit and the licence entry would either be the new licence or a combination of the new and old entries. It would seem from reading the various posting that the two missing feature= s are some sort of clean way of saying "this license or higher" and possibly something along the lines of "like this licence" for cases where 99% is the same as an existing OS licence, but I guess that last one comes down to a point of purpose. Is the licence framework supposed to be a solid legal structure or is it much like the pkg-descriptions just something we can filter against and use to help guide us to the ports we want to install?