Re: [Xen-devel] [PATCH for 4.7] libxenvchan: Change license of header from Lesser GPL v2.1 to BSD

[Konrad Rzeszutek Wilk <konrad.wilk@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, Jun 10, 2016 at 02:07:30PM +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:
> Ian Campbell writes ("Re: [PATCH for 4.7] libxenvchan: Change license of 
> header from Lesser GPL v2.1 to BSD"):
> > On Thu, 2016-06-09 at 16:43 +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:
> > > Konrad Rzeszutek Wilk writes ("[PATCH for 4.7] libxenvchan: Change
> > > license of header from Lesser GPL v2.1 to BSD"):
> > > > 
> > > > As the xen/COPYING file says:
> > > > "A few files are licensed under both GPL and a weaker BSD-style
> > > > license. This includes all files within the subdirectory
> > > > include/public, as described in include/public/COPYING. All such
> > > > files
> > > > include the non-GPL license text as a source-code comment. Although
> > > > the license text refers generically to "the software", the non-GPL
> > > > license applies *only* to those source files that explicitly
> > > > include
> > > > the non-GPL license text."
> > > I personally think this patch is a good idea.
> > 
> > To change xen/include/public/io/libxenvchan.h only or both that
> > and tools/libvchan/libxenvchan.h?
> 
> I hadn't thought about this distinction clearly enough.
> 
> > Historically the view of the Xen Project was the hypercall and PV ring
> > A[BP]Is should be BSD so that proprietary OSes could be ported to Xen
> > or PV drivers could be written for proprietary OSes etc.
> > 
> > But the view for toolstack libraries (libxenctrl, guest etc) was
> > traditionally that the project wanted them to remain copyleft. IIRC
> > originally one or both of libxenctrl and libxenguest were full-GPL but
> > we decided that was too far and went through a relicensing excercise to
> > make it LGPL, which allows for proprietary toolstack applications to be
> > built on top of the foundational libraries while still ensuring that
> > improvements to those libraries are contributed back.
> 
> Yes.
> 
> > So, I guess I don't really undertstand the case for / desire to
> > relicense tools/libvchan/libxenvchan.h, especially given that the other
> > tools/libvchan/*.[ch] files don't appear to be being relicensed in [0].

Just consistency.

> 
> I agree that it does not make sense to change
> tools/libvchan/libxenvchan.h on its own.  We should probably drop that
> change from this patch.

That is fine with me!

> 
> Ian.

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