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1<!--#include file="header.html" -->
2
3<p>
4<h3><a name="license">BusyBox is licensed under the GNU General Public License, version 2</a></h3>
5
6<p>BusyBox is licensed under <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html#SEC1">the
7GNU General Public License</a> version 2, which is often abbreviated as GPLv2.
8(This is the same license the Linux kernel is under, so you may be somewhat
9familiar with it by now.)</p>
10
11<p>A complete copy of the license text is included in the file LICENSE in
12the BusyBox source code.</p>
13
14<p><a href="products.html">Anyone thinking of shipping BusyBox as part of a
15product</a> should be familiar with the licensing terms under which they are
16allowed to use and distribute BusyBox. Read the full test of the GPL (either
17through the above link, or in the file LICENSE in the busybox tarball), and
18also read the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html">Frequently
19Asked Questions about the GPL</a>.</p>
20
21<p>Basically, if you distribute GPL software the license requires that you also
22distribute the source code to that GPL-licensed software. So if you distribute
23BusyBox without making the source code to the version you distribute available,
24you violate the license terms, and thus infringe on the copyrights of BusyBox.
25(This requirement applies whether or not you modified BusyBox; either way the
26license terms still apply to you.) Read the license text for the details.</p>
27
28<h3><a name="version">A note on GPL versions</a></h3>
29
30<p>Version 2 of the GPL is the only version of the GPL which current versions
31of BusyBox may be distributed under. New code added to the tree is licensed
32GPL version 2, and the project's license is GPL version 2.</p>
33
34<p>Older versions of BusyBox (versions 1.2.2 and earlier, up through about svn
3516112) included variants of the recommended
36&quot;GPL version 2 or (at your option) later versions&quot; boilerplate
37permission grant. Ancient versions of BusyBox
38(before svn 49) did not specify any version at all, and section 9 of GPLv2
39(the most recent version at that time) says those old versions may be
40redistributed under any version of GPL (including the obsolete V1). This was
41conceptually similar to a dual license, except that the different licenses were
42different versions of the GPL.</p>
43
44<p>However, BusyBox has apparently always contained chunks of code that were
45licensed under GPL version 2 only. Examples include applets written by Linus
46Torvalds (util-linux/mkfs_minix.c and util_linux/mkswap.c) which stated they
47&quot;may be redistributed as per the Linux copyright&quot; (which Linus
48clarified in the
492.4.0-pre8 release announcement in 2000 was GPLv2 only), and Linux kernel code
50copied into libbb/loop.c (after Linus's announcement). There are probably
51more, because all we used to check was that the code was GPL, not which
52version. (Before the GPLv3 draft proceedings in 2006, it was a purely
53theoretical issue that didn't come up much.)</p>
54
55<p>To summarize: every version of BusyBox may be distributed under the terms of
56GPL version 2. New versions (after 1.2.2) may <b>only</b> be distributed under
57GPLv2, not under other versions of the GPL. Older versions of BusyBox might
58(or might not) be distributable under other versions of the GPL. If you
59want to use a GPL version other than 2, you should start with one of the old
60versions such as release 1.2.2 or SVN 16112, and do your own homework to
61identify and remove any code that can't be licensed under the GPL version you
62want to use. New development is all GPLv2.</p>
63
64<h3><a name="enforce">License enforcement</a></h3>
65
66<p>BusyBox's copyrights are enforced by the <a
67href="http://www.softwarefreedom.org/">Software Freedom Law Center</a>
68(you can contact them at gpl@busybox.net), which
69&quot;accepts primary responsibility for enforcement of US copyrights on the
70software... and coordinates international copyright enforcement efforts for
71such works as necessary.&quot; If you distribute BusyBox in a way that doesn't
72comply with the terms of the license BusyBox is distributed under, expect to
73hear from these guys. Their entire reason for existing is to do pro-bono
74legal work for free/open source software projects. (We used to list people who
75violate the BusyBox license in <a href="shame.html">The Hall of Shame</a>,
76but these days we find it much more effective to hand them over to the
77lawyers.)</p>
78
79<p>Our enforcement efforts are aimed at bringing people into compliance with
80the BusyBox license. Open source software is under a different license from
81proprietary software, but if you violate that license you're still a software
82pirate and the law gives the vendor (us) some big sticks to play with. We
83don't want monetary awards, injunctions, or to generate bad PR for a company,
84unless that's the only way to get somebody that repeatedly ignores us to comply
85with the license on our code.</p>
86
87<h3><a name="good">A Good Example</a></h3>
88
89<p>These days, <a href="http://www.linksys.com/">Linksys</a> is
90doing a good job at complying with the GPL, they get to be an
91example of how to do things right. Please take a moment and
92check out what they do with
93<a href="http://www.linksys.com/servlet/Satellite?c=L_Content_C1&amp;childpagename=US%2FLayout&amp;cid=1115416836002&amp;pagename=Linksys%2FCommon%2FVisitorWrapper">
94distributing the firmware for their WRT54G Router.</a>
95Following their example would be a fine way to ensure that you
96have also fulfilled your licensing obligations.</p>
97
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