Hey all,
I'm currently working on getting SDL3_mixer into Fedora. [0]
While doing the packaging work, I noticed that SDL_mixer bundles
timidity for MIDI playback. [1]
The README file attached to the sources says:
> If you'd like to continue hacking on TiMidity, feel free. I'm
> hereby extending the TiMidity license agreement: you can now
> select the most convenient license for your needs from (1) the
> GNU GPL, (2) the GNU LGPL, or (3) the Perl Artistic License.
This statement is unfortunately a bit ambiguous, since it does not
mention which versions of the licences the author had in mind,
and the only license text attached is the Perl/Artistic one.
Digging through git history, one can see that the bundled code dates
all the way back to the initial git commit, hence at least to 1999,
i.e. before GPLv3 and LGPLv3 were published (2007). One can also find
commits directly mentioning GPLv2 or later. [2]
Getting to the point - can we assume (L)GPLv2 here?
This would make the applicable license tag be:
"GPL-2.0-or-later OR LGPL-2.0-or-later OR Artistic-1.0-Perl"
Which, looking at the allowed license list, seems okay for inclusion
in Fedora.
For extra context, the older SDL_mixer packages (SDL_mixer, SDL2_mixer)
do not make note of timidity's license in any way. While SDL2_mixer
has "Provides: bundled(timidity)", SDL_mixer doesn't even do that.
Thanks in advance,
Artur FI
[0] https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=2454358
[1] https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL_mixer/tree/release-3.2.4/src/timidity
[2] https://github.com/libsdl-org/SDL_mixer/commit/db1013fd0aeb884fcae21480a75d…
