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Switch license.html to BSD, and delete the old "FSF screwed over Mepis" rant (which while still true, is no longer relevant).
author Rob Landley <rob@landley.net>
date Tue, 15 Nov 2011 02:59:50 -0600
parents 8f0b24cc7cd7
children a0fa96c5c95c
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383:50906d6ad264 384:6fb2672851d9
1 <!--#include file="header.html" --> 1 <!--#include file="header.html" -->
2 2
3 <h2>Toybox is licensed under the terms of GPLv2.</h2> 3 <h2>Toybox is licensed under a simple 2-clause MIT/BSD style license:</h2>
4 4
5 <p>The complete text of the General Public License version 2 is included in the 5 <blockquote>
6 file LICENSE in each source tarball. Version 2 is the only version of this 6 <p>Copyright (C) 2006 by Rob Landley &lt;rob@landley.net&gt;
7 license which toybox is distributed under. (I.E. It doesn't have the strange
8 "or later" dual license some projects have.)</p>
9 7
10 <p>The complete text of GPLv2 is at the end of this page.</p> 8 <p>Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any
9 purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
10 copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.</p>
11 11
12 <h2>Clarifications</h2> 12 <p>THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES
13 WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
14 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR
15 ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES
16 WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN
17 ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF
18 OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.</p>
19 </blockquote>
13 20
14 <p>The GPL is a bit old and crufty in places, but it's still the best open 21 <P>The text of this license is included in the file LICENSE in the source.</p>
15 source license there is, and lots of source code (like the Linux kernel) is
16 distributed under it. Lots of de facto interpretations have sprung up to deal
17 with things like the fact that it predates the internet service provider
18 industry. Nothing in the rest of this page changes the actual license, so you
19 can ignore the rest of this page if you're happy with a strict reading of
20 GPLv2. But just to be clear, here's how the authors of this project are
21 interpreting the sucker where it says something stupid.</p>
22
23 <p>Section 1: <b>You have permission to rephrase the license notice on
24 individual source files.</b> This doesn't mean you can change what license the
25 code is under, or that you can remove other people's copyright notices. You
26 certainly can't change the text of the GPL itself. What it means is that if
27 a file says "see file LICENSE in this tarball for details" and you use this
28 code in a project that distributes source in zip files instead of
29 tarballs, or your package's copy of the GPLv2 text isn't in a file called
30 "LICENSE", it's silly to preserve an obsolete notice verbatim and add some
31 kind of "correction" after the old notice.</p>
32
33 <p>Some lawyers seem to think a strict reading of GPLv2 section 1 (and later
34 sections including section 1 by reference) requires maintaining old notices in
35 perpetuity. Even if you had code that used to be dual licensed, but you created
36 a derived work that's just under one of the two licenses, and thus keeping the
37 old license notice is not just strange or misleading but actually incorrect for
38 the new file. (For example, splicing GPLv2 only code into a dual "GPLv2 or
39 later" project produces a result that can be distributed under the terms of
40 GPLv2, but not GPLv3. The result of that cannot be distributed under the "or
41 later" part, so a license notice implying it could is factually wrong.)</p>
42
43 <p>I don't know if we're ever going to add any dual licensed code into the tree,
44 but I want to head that one off now. The actual license text is the important
45 thing, the per-file notice is a courtesy.</p>
46
47 <p>Section 2: <b>We don't put the change history in comments in the source
48 code, we put it in our source control system.</b> We have source control for a
49 reason. That's where this information belongs, and that's where we put it.
50 It's world readable on the web, and you can download a snapshot of the whole
51 repository if you like. The GPL predates modern source control systems, but
52 this project does not.</p>
53
54 <p>Section 3: <b>We distribute source code through the internet.</b> If
55 your "written offer" includes a URL, and the source code remains anonymously
56 downloadable at that location for three years after you stop distributing
57 binaries, life is good as far as we're concerned. (No, you can't encrypt it,
58 or require a login, or otherwise be slimy bastards acting in bad faith. We'll
59 come after you if you're not satisfying the terms of the license, this is just
60 talking about how you can satisfy those terms without having to mail physical
61 media circa 1991. Most people are already doing it this way, we're just
62 being explicit about it.)</p>
63
64 <p>If you're wondering why this particular clarification exists,
65 there's a <a href=licenserant.html>longer explanation</a>.</p>
66
67 <p>Finally, <b>section 9 does not apply to this project.</b> We're specifying
68 a specific version, it's version 2. There is no "or later versions" clause to
69 require interpreting, so none of that triggers for us.</p>
70
71 <hr>
72 <pre>
73 GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
74 Version 2, June 1991
75
76 Copyright (C) 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
77 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
78 Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
79 of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
80
81 Preamble
82
83 The licenses for most software are designed to take away your
84 freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public
85 License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free
86 software--to make sure the software is free for all its users. This
87 General Public License applies to most of the Free Software
88 Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to
89 using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by
90 the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You can apply it to
91 your programs, too.
92
93 When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not
94 price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you
95 have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for
96 this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it
97 if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it
98 in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.
99
100 To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid
101 anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights.
102 These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you
103 distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.
104
105 For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether
106 gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that
107 you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the
108 source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their
109 rights.
110
111 We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and
112 (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy,
113 distribute and/or modify the software.
114
115 Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain
116 that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free
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121
122 Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software
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126 patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
127
128 The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
129 modification follow.
130
131 GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
132 TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
133
134 0. This License applies to any program or other work which contains
135 a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
136 under the terms of this General Public License. The "Program", below,
137 refers to any such program or work, and a "work based on the Program"
138 means either the Program or any derivative work under copyright law:
139 that is to say, a work containing the Program or a portion of it,
140 either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another
141 language. (Hereinafter, translation is included without limitation in
142 the term "modification".) Each licensee is addressed as "you".
143
144 Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not
145 covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of
146 running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program
147 is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the
148 Program (independent of having been made by running the Program).
149 Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.
150
151 1. You may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the Program's
152 source code as you receive it, in any medium, provided that you
153 conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate
154 copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty; keep intact all the
155 notices that refer to this License and to the absence of any warranty;
156 and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License
157 along with the Program.
158
159 You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and
160 you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.
161
162 2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion
163 of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and
164 distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1
165 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:
166
167 a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
168 stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
169
170 b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in
171 whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any
172 part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third
173 parties under the terms of this License.
174
175 c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively
176 when run, you must cause it, when started running for such
177 interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an
178 announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a
179 notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide
180 a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under
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182 License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but
183 does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on
184 the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
185
186 These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If
187 identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program,
188 and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in
189 themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those
190 sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you
191 distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based
192 on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of
193 this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the
194 entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
195
196 Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest
197 your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to
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199 collective works based on the Program.
200
201 In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program
202 with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of
203 a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under
204 the scope of this License.
205
206 3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it,
207 under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of
208 Sections 1 and 2 above provided that you also do one of the following:
209
210 a) Accompany it with the complete corresponding machine-readable
211 source code, which must be distributed under the terms of Sections
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213
214 b) Accompany it with a written offer, valid for at least three
215 years, to give any third party, for a charge no more than your
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218 distributed under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above on a medium
219 customarily used for software interchange; or,
220
221 c) Accompany it with the information you received as to the offer
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225 an offer, in accord with Subsection b above.)
226
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237
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241 distribution of the source code, even though third parties are not
242 compelled to copy the source along with the object code.
243
244 4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program
245 except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt
246 otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is
247 void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License.
248 However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under
249 this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such
250 parties remain in full compliance.
251
252 5. You are not required to accept this License, since you have not
253 signed it. However, nothing else grants you permission to modify or
254 distribute the Program or its derivative works. These actions are
255 prohibited by law if you do not accept this License. Therefore, by
256 modifying or distributing the Program (or any work based on the
257 Program), you indicate your acceptance of this License to do so, and
258 all its terms and conditions for copying, distributing or modifying
259 the Program or works based on it.
260
261 6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
262 Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
263 original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
264 these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
265 restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
266 You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
267 this License.
268
269 7. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
270 infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
271 conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
272 otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
273 excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot
274 distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this
275 License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you
276 may not distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent
277 license would not permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by
278 all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you, then
279 the only way you could satisfy both it and this License would be to
280 refrain entirely from distribution of the Program.
281
282 If any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under
283 any particular circumstance, the balance of the section is intended to
284 apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other
285 circumstances.
286
287 It is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any
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295 to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot
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297
298 This section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to
299 be a consequence of the rest of this License.
300
301 8. If the distribution and/or use of the Program is restricted in
302 certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces, the
303 original copyright holder who places the Program under this License
304 may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding
305 those countries, so that distribution is permitted only in or among
306 countries not thus excluded. In such case, this License incorporates
307 the limitation as if written in the body of this License.
308
309 9. The Free Software Foundation may publish revised and/or new versions
310 of the General Public License from time to time. Such new versions will
311 be similar in spirit to the present version, but may differ in detail to
312 address new problems or concerns.
313
314 Each version is given a distinguishing version number. If the Program
315 specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and "any
316 later version", you have the option of following the terms and conditions
317 either of that version or of any later version published by the Free
318 Software Foundation. If the Program does not specify a version number of
319 this License, you may choose any version ever published by the Free Software
320 Foundation.
321
322 10. If you wish to incorporate parts of the Program into other free
323 programs whose distribution conditions are different, write to the author
324 to ask for permission. For software which is copyrighted by the Free
325 Software Foundation, write to the Free Software Foundation; we sometimes
326 make exceptions for this. Our decision will be guided by the two goals
327 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
328 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
329
330 NO WARRANTY
331
332 11. BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
333 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. EXCEPT WHEN
334 OTHERWISE STATED IN WRITING THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND/OR OTHER PARTIES
335 PROVIDE THE PROGRAM "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED
336 OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF
337 MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS
338 TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE
339 PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING,
340 REPAIR OR CORRECTION.
341
342 12. IN NO EVENT UNLESS REQUIRED BY APPLICABLE LAW OR AGREED TO IN WRITING
343 WILL ANY COPYRIGHT HOLDER, OR ANY OTHER PARTY WHO MAY MODIFY AND/OR
344 REDISTRIBUTE THE PROGRAM AS PERMITTED ABOVE, BE LIABLE TO YOU FOR DAMAGES,
345 INCLUDING ANY GENERAL, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES ARISING
346 OUT OF THE USE OR INABILITY TO USE THE PROGRAM (INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED
347 TO LOSS OF DATA OR DATA BEING RENDERED INACCURATE OR LOSSES SUSTAINED BY
348 YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
349 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
350 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
351
352 END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
353 </pre>
354 22
355 <!--#include file="footer.html" --> 23 <!--#include file="footer.html" -->