GDB 6.8 - license terms

GDB 6.8 - license terms

[Volkmann, Patrick]

Hi,
 
i would appreciate your help with the following issue:
 
The file "README" in the GDB 6.8 root contains the following phrase (line 42):
"...See the file COPYING or
COPYING.LIB in the various directories, for a description of the
GNU General Public License terms under which you can copy the files..."
 
Now we detected in the source code GPL v2 and GPL v3 license terms 
(e.g in the root, \gdb-6.8\COPYING and \gdb-6.8\COPYING3)
 
But some subfolders only contain the GPL v2 license 
(e.g. \gdb-6.8\bfd\COPYING, \gdb-6.8\gdb\COPYING, ... )
 
Because of the incompatibility between GPLv3 and GPLv2, 
we are not sure if we can consider the whole component as licensed under the terms of GPL v3.
 
Can you please help me with this issue?
 
THX in advance

With best regards,
Patrick Volkmann 

Siemens AG 
Industry Sector
Industry Automation Division
Advanced Technologies & Standards 
I IA&DT ATS 13 
Gleiwitzer Str. 555 
90475 Nuremberg, Germany 
Tel.: +49 (911) 895-3821 
mailto:patrick.volkmann@siemens.com 

Siemens Aktiengesellschaft: Chairman of the Supervisory Board: Gerhard Cromme; Managing Board: Peter Loescher, Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer; Wolfgang Dehen, Heinrich Hiesinger, Joe Kaeser, Barbara Kux, Hermann Requardt, Siegfried Russwurm, Peter Y. Solmssen; Registered offices: Berlin and Munich, Germany; Commercial registries: Berlin Charlottenburg, HRB 12300, Munich, HRB 6684; WEEE-Reg.-No. DE 23691322 

Re: GDB 6.8 - license terms

[Daniel Jacobowitz]

On Tue, Apr 21, 2009 at 04:03:46PM +0200, Volkmann, Patrick wrote:
> Hi,
>  
> i would appreciate your help with the following issue:
>  
> The file "README" in the GDB 6.8 root contains the following phrase (line 42):
> "...See the file COPYING or
> COPYING.LIB in the various directories, for a description of the
> GNU General Public License terms under which you can copy the files..."
>  
> Now we detected in the source code GPL v2 and GPL v3 license terms 
> (e.g in the root, \gdb-6.8\COPYING and \gdb-6.8\COPYING3)
>  
> But some subfolders only contain the GPL v2 license 
> (e.g. \gdb-6.8\bfd\COPYING, \gdb-6.8\gdb\COPYING, ... )
>  
> Because of the incompatibility between GPLv3 and GPLv2, 
> we are not sure if we can consider the whole component as licensed under the terms of GPL v3.
>  
> Can you please help me with this issue?

Most FSF-owned code is licensed under the "GPL v2 or later" or "GPL v3
or later".  When you mix those two, you must handle the result under
GPL v3 (or a later version as released by the FSF in the future).

It's not the COPYING files that are important, in any case, but the
notices on the individual sources.  GDB moved to GPLv3 around
2007-08-23, which was before the release of GDB 6.8.

-- 
Daniel Jacobowitz
CodeSourcery