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> “GPLv2 or later” says you are allowed to use it under GPLv2 or GPLv3 I am afraid, that you are wrong. GPL does not govern usage of software at all. You don't
by yc12340 6y ago
> “GPLv2 or later” says you are allowed to use it under GPLv2 or GPLv3
I am afraid, that you are wrong. GPL does not govern usage of software at all. You don't need to agree to GPL in order to use GPL licensed software. This is literally said in text of GPL itself.
The preamble ("this program is free software...") is not part of GPL itself — it is just short informative text. And you are misremembering, what preamble says. Citing from GNU website:
> 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 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
I believe, that we should erase all SPDX-whatever nonsense from Linux source code, and replace it back with proper preamble — least other users of GPL software start to misremember as well.
- Conan_Kudo 6y agothe SPDX short identifiers are a great way for people to misunderstand how the license works. The preamble that the FSF suggests makes it clear what it does, why it works that way, and how you can leverage it.
- yrro 6y ago> You don't need to agree to GPL in order to use GPL licensed software. I've wondered for some time how a user is granted permission to use GPL-licensed software; permission is not explicitly granted by the GPL, but it is required so that the user can copy the software to their computer, and into memory for it to be executed, is it not? (I am aware that the answer will vary by jurisdiction)
- CrLf 6y agoThe GPL does not explicitly grant permission to use the software, that is true. However, its terms are clear about the conditions in which you lose that right.