Re: [Help-bash] License Question

[Bob Proulx]

Chet Ramey wrote:
> H.Tsurumoto wrote:
> > Today, I watched bash4.3 source-code, and I read "lib/sh/inet_aton.c"
> > It was 4-clause BSD licensed file.
> 
> If you read that comment in inet_aton.c, you should have read the text
> that immediately precedes it, which explains its provenance:
> 
> /* Snagged from GNU C library, version 2.0.3. */
> 
> The current glibc still has BSD-licensed files, including the one you're
> talking about (resolv/inet_addr.c).

Note that the origin of that file is:

 * Copyright (c) 1983, 1990, 1993
 *    The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.

The fourth advertising clause that used to appear between clauses
2 and 3 was rescinded by the University of California Berkeley in
1999.  Please see this reference:

  ftp://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/pub/4bsd/README.Impt.License.Change

This applies only to software licensed by BSD and not to all BSD
4-clause software licensed by OTHER authors.  Many other people used
the BSD 4-clause license and those remain incompatible unless they
also modify their licenses.  But all BSD software using it was
modified by the above license change and is now compatible.  By that
change it is no longer the 4-clause license.

In theory I think it would be possible to modify the license
everywhere.  In practice there are too many copies to modify all of
them and therefore many (most?) are unmodified as a practical matter.

Note IANAL and this is only AIUI.

Bob