Re: [qemu-s390x] [PATCH] s390x: Fix the confusing contributions-after-2012 license statements

[Alexander Graf]

On 02/11/2019 04:31 PM, Cornelia Huck wrote:
> On Mon, 11 Feb 2019 16:24:48 +0100
> Alexander Graf <address@hidden> wrote:
>
> > On 02/06/2019 02:02 PM, Laurent Vivier wrote:
> > > On 06/02/2019 13:58, Cornelia Huck wrote:
> > > > On Wed,  6 Feb 2019 13:41:33 +0100
> > > > Thomas Huth <address@hidden> wrote:
> > > >   
> > > > > The license information in these files is rather confusing. The text
> > > > > declares LGPL first, but then says that contributions after 2012 are
> > > > > licensed under the GPL instead. How should the average user who just
> > > > > downloaded the release tarball know which part is now GPL and which
> > > > > is LGPL?
> > > > FWIW, that statement was added in ccb084d3f0ec ("s390: new
> > > > contributions GPLv2 or later").
> > > >   
> > > > > Looking at the text of the LGPL (see COPYING.LIB in the top directory),
> > > > > the license clearly states how this should be done instead:
> > > > >
> > > > > "3. You may opt to apply the terms of the ordinary GNU General Public
> > > > >    License instead of this License to a given copy of the Library. To do
> > > > >    this, you must alter all the notices that refer to this License, so
> > > > >    that they refer to the ordinary GNU General Public License, version 2,
> > > > >    instead of to this License."
> > > > Hm. This talks about GPL v2, not GPL v2-or-later...
> > > >   
> > > > > Thus let's clean up the confusing statements and use the proper GPL
> > > > > text only.
> > > > >
> > > > > Signed-off-by: Thomas Huth <address@hidden>
> > > > > ---
> > > > >    linux-user/s390x/target_cpu.h | 19 ++++++++-----------
> > > > >    target/s390x/cpu.c            | 19 ++++++++-----------
> > > > >    target/s390x/cpu.h            | 19 ++++++++-----------
> > > > >    target/s390x/kvm.c            | 19 ++++++++-----------
> > > > BTW: Is the original author of the code still around?
> > > For the linux-user/s390x/target_cpu.h, it seems this code has been pushed by 
> > > Alex Graf:
> > >
> > > commit 10ec51174ca69a4c3c5149b0b3baaa6ccba66273
> > > Author: Alexander Graf <address@hidden>
> > > Date:   Sat Dec 5 12:44:21 2009 +0100
> > >
> > >       S/390 CPU fake emulation
> > >       
> > >       Because Qemu currently requires a TCG target to exist and there are quite some
> > >       useful helpers here to lay the groundwork for out KVM target, let's 
> > > create a
> > >       stub TCG emulation target for S390X CPUs.
> > >       
> > >       This is required to make tcg happy. The emulation target itself won't work
> > >       though.
> > >       
> > >       Signed-off-by: Alexander Graf <address@hidden>
> > >       Signed-off-by: Aurelien Jarno <address@hidden>
> > >
> > > But the "(c) 2009 Ulrich Hecht" is confusing.
> > Why? Ulrich was the one that started the port, I then cleaned it up,
> > improved it, added system emulation and upstreamed it.
> It's just a bit confusing that Ulrich does not show up in the sign-off
> chain.
>
> > What problem exactly are you trying to solve?
> The confusing license statements?
>
> I thought I'd ask whether the original author had any thoughts; if you
> think this patch is problematic, I can dequeue it again.

You can always combine LGPL and GPL code and the result becomes GPL 
only, so I see little problem? :)

Alex