Thread: GPL code issue?

Hi,

In src/backend/parser/parse.h there is a copyright that reads as below.
Note the bottom section that says that the GPL is only excepted for
files generated by Bison *from* this file. This implies to me that this
file is GPL'd, and therefore shouldn't be in the tarball (or pgAdmin
where Andreas wants to use it) - or have I missed something?

Regards, Dave.

/* A Bison parser, made by GNU Bison 1.875.  */

/* Skeleton parser for Yacc-like parsing with Bison,
   Copyright (C) 1984, 1989, 1990, 2000, 2001, 2002 Free Software
Foundation, Inc.

   This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
   it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
   the Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option)
   any later version.

   This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
   but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
   MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
   GNU General Public License for more details.

   You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
   along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
   Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330,
   Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA.  */

/* As a special exception, when this file is copied by Bison into a
   Bison output file, you may use that output file without restriction.
   This special exception was added by the Free Software Foundation
   in version 1.24 of Bison.  */

"Dave Page" <dpage@vale-housing.co.uk> writes:
> In src/backend/parser/parse.h there is a copyright that reads as below.
> Note the bottom section that says that the GPL is only excepted for
> files generated by Bison *from* this file. This implies to me that this
> file is GPL'd,

No.  The text in question is copied verbatim from some Bison component
file that supplies a lot of fixed boilerplate for Bison output files.
It's not very well phrased, perhaps, but their intent is clearly to
exempt Bison output files from the GPL, and this *is* a Bison output
file.

            regards, tom lane

Dave Page wrote:

>/* A Bison parser, made by GNU Bison 1.875.  */
>
Given that this file appears to be produced *by* Bison, and given this
exception:

>/* As a special exception, when this file is copied by Bison into a
>   Bison output file, you may use that output file without restriction.
>   This special exception was added by the Free Software Foundation
>   in version 1.24 of Bison.  */
>
it would appear that the file can be used without restriction.  Any
output from bison or flex is non-GPL, AIUI.  Any input *into* bison,
which is GPL'd before processing, *is* restricted.  Given that bison
doesn't take .h files as input, doesn't it make sense that this was
produced *by* bison, and thus unrestricted?

ahp