Samba and GPL

[Andrew Tridgell]

Andreas,

ok, sorry if I overreacted. I assumed this was in response to the
recent news about GFS and that you were concerned Samba would go the
same way. 

> - the copyright should be concentrated to you or the samba team, so you have
> a chance to fight against people that don't honor GPL.

I don't mind if the copyright is diluted, as long as the copyright is
held by people who actually write the code. I believe fairly strongly
that programmers are more likely to make decisions that are in the
best interests of the project than the companies they work for. 

> - The statement about the GPL version to use should be changed, because no
> one knows how the GPL will look in future.

I have considered that, but I don't think it is necessary. The
original reason for the "or later" clause in the GPL is still quite
valid and I have not seen any firm indication that RMS plans to change
the GPL in a way that would not be in the best interests of the Samba
project. In fact, removing this clause could cause us serious problems
if a newer version of the GPL is released and we have code from
authors that only says "version 2" as that might mean we could not
choose to make new versions of Samba available under the new version
of the GPL (at least without getting permission from all authors).

I rather hope that any new GPL provides a clearer definition of a
derived work, in particular the definition of linking. Right now that
part of the GPL is a little unclear.

I know that RMS might use some wording in the GPL to pursue a
political agenda, but I think that is a rather minor issue in the
broad scheme of things. I'd be extremely surprised if he seriously
damaged the aims of the GPL with any such wording.

I will keep looking at it from time to time, but right now I think the
best thing is to keep that "or later" clause.

Cheers, Tridge