License and adopting software

Sid sid at bsdmail.com
Tue Dec 26 23:16:46 UTC 2017


> 'someone else said something to the effect of  "If I looked at the code already, the license is already contaminated"'
That makes no sense to me. That advice seems counterproductive. In the source code, I'm sure you saw this, but there are different licenses in the files.
 
Usually, when someone adds on top of FreeBSD's license, that part belongs (or is at least dual/multi-licensed) in FreeBSD.
 
The only separator I understand is, the files, to have their distinctive licenses, to differentiate it from the rest of the packaged source code, but first distinguish it as your creation, copyright and license. I don't know if a line within a file can have a different license, unless that line was already established as MIT, or the creator releasing that line to GPL.
 
The odd part is, if a code goes into GPL, they get to license it. But if those lines are already MIT, that code is multi-licensed under both MIT and GPL. If code goes into a GPL code first, and the author didn't claim it as their own first, it's odd, (that code will be for GPL, but) I don't know if you can use that code for outside of GPL, even if you wrote it. I don't know about that, but it's safer to claim that code as your own, your project's or your pseudonym, before writing it into a GPL code to fix it. I wish there was someone who can clarify that.

I guess you're trying to find out or audit if everything within a code is GPL? That may be hard. I would start a new file, with your own license, informally copyright your creation with simple copyright text and license (not through the office: use the copyright office for your best or proprietary work), then maybe merge it afterwards. There is better advice on protecting your contribution's license, and how they interact. Some of that can be found by looking around, but it would be nice if someone who is really familiar with that would tell what they can.


More information about the freebsd-ports mailing list