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I don't think clause 2b says that, do you perhaps mean clause 2a? In GPLv2 that says: > a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating

I don't think clause 2b says that, do you perhaps mean clause 2a? In GPLv2 that says: > a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change. while in GPLv3 it says > a) The work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it, and giving a relevant date. Note that git/svn are not always relevant. In particular, it is not uncommon to distribute release code with the .git directory stripped - this does not excuse you from the requirement. Having said that, I had a quick glance at Linux, and picking a file at random it did have a copyright header, but certainly not one that included a record of every change. https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/master/init/calibrate.c https://github.com/torvalds/linux/blob/master/init/calibrate... So it doesn't look like this is peculiar to v2. But it does seem like people don't follow the letter of the requirement. I wonder if the FSF has ever clarified this.

Sophira 2y ago
My understanding is that most projects that are licensed with GPLv2 actually say that they're licensed for GPLv2 "or any later version" (the Linux kernel being a notable exception). So, you could use GPLv3 instead, which would allow you to just say that the work itself has changed, not the individual files.
- tempfile 2y ago
  I don't think this is actually a significant difference between GPLv2 and v3. At the bottom of the quoted list of requirements, v2 says: > These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. It is possible that v3's wording was cleaned up to make it clearer that individual file-level changes were not required. I have no doubt that git history would be considered sufficient metadata provided it was included in a release. We probably will never see a court test the attribution requirement in enough detail to settle this (in other words, it probably doesn't matter)

Sophira 2y ago

My understanding is that most projects that are licensed with GPLv2 actually say that they're licensed for GPLv2 "or any later version" (the Linux kernel being a notable exception). So, you could use GPLv3 instead, which would allow you to just say that the work itself has changed, not the individual files.

tempfile 2y ago
I don't think this is actually a significant difference between GPLv2 and v3. At the bottom of the quoted list of requirements, v2 says: > These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. It is possible that v3's wording was cleaned up to make it clearer that individual file-level changes were not required. I have no doubt that git history would be considered sufficient metadata provided it was included in a release. We probably will never see a court test the attribution requirement in enough detail to settle this (in other words, it probably doesn't matter)