syslogd quesstion

[Derek Martin]

On Mon, Nov 14, 2005 at 08:47:09PM +0000, James Wilkinson wrote:
> Derek Martin wrote:
> > For the record, the Linux syslogd is not a GNU program at all...  it
> > is derived from the orginal BSD Unix sources.  The licenses are
> > incompatible.
> 
> Um.
> 
> Since we're going for the record, the documentation in the RPM agrees
> that it's derived from the BSD syslogd, nor does it appear to be part of
> the GNU project.

Indeed.

> But it appears to be GPL:
> $ rpm -qf /sbin/syslogd --queryformat %{LICENSE}\\n
> GPL
> (although I can't see a license anywhere in the RPM).

I think it's very possible that this is just an error on the part of
the packager.  However, that's likely irrelevant.

If the code is being released without any statement of copyright or
license, then I believe it can be assumed to be in the public domain.
(But that pretty much is the same as the BSD license anyway.) It's
been a while since I looked into those issues, and IANAL, but I
believe that's more-or-less correct.

> Since the Regents of the University of California dropped the
> advertising clause from the BSD license, the resulting three-clause BSD
> license *is* understood to be GPL compatible:
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#ModifiedBSD

Well, from the GNU project's perspective they are compatible; but in
reality they are only partially compatible.  That is, one can take
BSD-licensed  code, modify it, and release the resulting code under
the GPL.  However, one can not subsequently take the resulting GPL'd
code, modify it, and re-release it under the BSD license.  Thus they
are not compatible.

> So this state of affairs appears plausible: somewhere along the line,
> someone released their modified version under the GPL.

That is unclear.

> But it's not a matter of licenses, it's just that these days most
> Free Software, even GPLed software, isn't technically part of the
> GNU project.

True enough.

-- 
Derek D. Martin
http://www.pizzashack.org/
GPG Key ID: 0x81CFE75D

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