Re: PostgreSQL & the BSD License - Mailing list pgsql-general

On Thu, 6 Jul 2000, Tom Lane wrote:

> The Hermit Hacker <scrappy@hub.org> writes:
> > On Thu, 6 Jul 2000, Tom Lane wrote:
> >> The Hermit Hacker <scrappy@hub.org> writes:
> >>>> I would like to plug this in early next week, unless someone can see
> >>>> something major that makes them feel uncomfortable ...
> >>
> >> What are you trying to do Marc, foreclose a full discussion?  I think
> >> this is *way* premature.
>
> > No ... what I posted as a replacement for our current COPYRIGHT is the
> > *base* that nobody disagrees with ... I don't care if everyone wants to
> > argue til their are blue in the face for the next 6 months concerning the
> > two paras that were drop'd, we can always add them in later, its just
> > removing stuff that is a pita ...
>
> It sounded a lot like you were trying to say "this is what we're going
> to do, end of discussion".  I take it that wasn't what you meant, but
> it sure read that way from here ...

The more I think on this, the less I'm sure that we *should* be changing
anything though ... why hasn't FreeBSD (a primarily US based, BSD
licensed, Open Source Project) changed it?  Has NetBSD?  OpenBSD?  Why is
it good enough for them, and all of their commercial clients and
affiliates, but not good enough for us?  Actually, just took a look at the
COPYRIGHT that comes with FreeBSD ... shit, wait a second ... didn't the
BSD COPYRIGHT just *have* a change? ... <insert explicitive here> ...

Ya, there was a recent change, that can be seen at:
ftp://ftp.cs.berkeley.edu/pub/4bsd/README.Impt.License.Change ... but, if
you look at the FreeBSD COPYRIGHT in /usr/src, I'm guessing that we've
never kept up with *any* of the changes to the BSD COPYRIGHT ... we just
used the one that came with Postgres95 originally and assumed that
Berkeley never changed it ...

===================
# $FreeBSD: src/COPYRIGHT,v 1.4 1999/09/05 21:33:47 obrien Exp $
#       @(#)COPYRIGHT   8.2 (Berkeley) 3/21/94

All of the documentation and software included in the 4.4BSD and
4.4BSD-Lite
Releases is copyrighted by The Regents of the University of California.

Copyright 1979, 1980, 1983, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994
        The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
are met:
1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
   notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
   notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
   documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
   must display the following acknowledgement:
This product includes software developed by the University of
California, Berkeley and its contributors.
4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
   may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
   without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
SUCH DAMAGE.
========================

there is more dealing with X and whatnot ... the ftp URL I gave above
removes clause 3 in the above:

=========================
> more README.Impt.License.Change

July 22, 1999

To All Licensees, Distributors of Any Version of BSD:

As you know, certain of the Berkeley Software Distribution ("BSD") source
code files require that further distributions of products containing all or
portions of the software, acknowledge within their advertising materials
that such products contain software developed by UC Berkeley and its
contributors.

Specifically, the provision reads:

"     * 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
      *    must display the following acknowledgement:
      *    This product includes software developed by the University of
      *    California, Berkeley and its contributors."

Effective immediately, licensees and distributors are no longer required to
include the acknowledgement within advertising materials.  Accordingly, the
foregoing paragraph of those BSD Unix files containing it is hereby deleted
in its entirety.

William Hoskins
Director, Office of Technology Licensing
University of California, Berkeley
============================

From reading the above COPYRIGHT in FreeBSD, it sounds like our version is
out of date with the version everyone else is using, and that the changes
we are discussing here have already been discussed and made, just nobody
told us ...