Re: license naming

[ng0]

Jelle Licht transcribed 2.3K bytes:
> 
> ng0 <address@hidden> writes:
> 
> > I've just read this link: 
> > https://www.fsf.org/blogs/rms/rms-article-for-claritys-sake-please-dont-say-licensed-under-gnu-gpl-2
> >
> > Full Quote:
> >
> >> In this article, For Clarity's Sake, Please Don't Say "Licensed under GNU 
> >> GPL 2"!, Free Software Foundation president Richard Stallman (RMS) 
> >> explains how to properly identify what GNU license your work is under. 
> >> Whenever a developer releases their work under a GNU license, they have 
> >> the option to either release it under that version of the license only, or 
> >> to make it available under any later version of that license. This option 
> >> ensures that software can remain compatible with future versions of the 
> >> license. But what happens if someone just says their program is under GNU 
> >> GPL version 2, for example?
> >>
> >>>    [T]hey are leaving the licensing of the program unclear. Is it 
> >>> released under GPL-2.0-only, or GPL-2.0-or-later? Can you merge the code 
> >>> with packages released under GPL-3.0-or-later?
> >>
> >> Thus, it is vitally important that developers indicate in their license 
> >> notices whether they are licensing their work under that version "only" or 
> >> under "any later version." Of course, these days it is also helpful for 
> >> license notices to be machine-readable. The Software Package Data Exchange 
> >> (SPDX) specification sets a standardized way of identifying licenses on 
> >> software packages. They are updating their license identifiers to include 
> >> this distinction in their upcoming version. For example, for GNU GPL 
> >> version 2, the identifiers are now "GPL-2.0-only or GPL-2.0-or-later." The 
> >> old identifiers (e.g. "GPL-2.0") are now deprecated and should no longer 
> >> be used. Based on the changes SPDX says are coming in the SPDX 
> >> specification and its Web site, the FSF expects to endorse the new version 
> >> of the SPDX. We thank SPDX and their community for making these helpful 
> >> changes.
> >
> >
> > Maybe we could make use of what https://spdx.org/licenses/
> > provides. I didn't compare the names with our names, I'll do
> > this on the train next week.
> > Good idea, bad idea?
> 
> We already have a `spdx-string->license' function in
> `(guix import utils)', in case you need a starting point. It
> makes sense to me to use a de facto way of referring to licenses,
> but I am not sure whether this has some disadvantages compared to the
> currently used way of referring to licenses.
> 
> - Jelle

My "problem", or rather the question I pose is: Does it make sense to
adjust how the license is displayed? Like instead of "GPL 2" We'd display
"GPL 2.0 only" and instead of "GPL 2+" (no example at hand to test if this
is the current display) we'd display "GPL 2 or later".
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