[ubuntu-uk] Microsoft Releases Linux Device Drivers as GPL

[Rob Beard]

Dave Walker wrote:
> Rob Beard wrote:
>   
>> Chris Rowson wrote:
>>     
>>> Interesting little story found on /.
>>>
>>> http://news.slashdot.org/story/09/07/20/1643251/Microsoft-Releases-Linux-Device-Drivers-As-GPL
>>>
>>> Chris
>>>       
>> Anyone known the URL for the weather in Hell on the Met Office web site? :-)
>>
>> Still, sounds good that they are releasing something under the GPL, 
>> funny how they didn't release it under GPL 3.
>>
>> Rob
>>
>>
>>     
>
> Hi Rob:
>
> Well part of the standard clause of GPLv2 states:
>
> "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 of the License, or (at your
> option) any later version." [0]
>
> IANAL, but to me that states that anything released under GPLv2 is
> automatically compatible with GPLv3, and any later license if it suits me.
>
> [0] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt
>
>   
That's what I thought.  So surely GPL v3 modules could be used in the 
Linux kernel then?

Or is it because this code is going to be part of the kernel (even so I 
presume as a module) that it can't be released under the GPL v3?

Rob