{"id":"GPL-2.0-or-later-with-Autoconf-exception-2.0","title":"GNU General Public License v2.0 or later with Autoconf exception 2.0","reviewed_on":"2026-09-22","reviewer":"Giray Havur","text_source":"https://raw.githubusercontent.com/spdx/license-list-data/main/text/GPL-2.0-or-later.txt","text_retrieved":true,"verdict":"created","summary":"The record models GPL version 2 or later with the Autoconf exception 2.0, the combination the older releases of GNU Autoconf carry. It keeps every statement of the GPL-2.0-or-later record and adds one permission for the configure scripts that Autoconf writes, which you need not distribute under the GPL. The condition that voids the exception for a modified Autoconf has no term and is quoted.","findings":[{"rubric":1,"severity":"info","field":"spdx:licenseId","description":"File name, record identifier, IRI local name and title agree. spdx:licenseId carries the SPDX expression \"GPL-2.0-or-later WITH Autoconf-exception-2.0\": the base identifier, one space, WITH in capitals, one space, the exception identifier. No record in the library carried an expression before, so the SPDX mapping and the spdx route have to accept the space and the keyword.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":1,"severity":"info","field":"cc:legalcode","description":"cc:legalcode points at the text of the base licence, https://www.gnu.org/licenses/old-licenses/gpl-2.0.html, because that is the licence the record models. dct:source points at the SPDX page of the exception, https://spdx.org/licenses/Autoconf-exception-2.0.html, because that is where the additional permission is published.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":2,"severity":"info","field":"odrl:target","description":"odrl:target is the one the base record carries: an odrl:AssetCollection of dct:type dcmitype:Software. The exception is about program files, so nothing changes.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":3,"severity":"major","field":"odrl:permission","description":"The exception reads: \"As a special exception, the Free Software Foundation gives unlimited permission to copy, distribute and modify the configure scripts that are the output of Autoconf. You need not follow the terms of the GNU General Public License when using or distributing such scripts, even though portions of the text of Autoconf appear in them.\" The configure scripts are material the licence conditions no longer reach, which is the permission dalicc:exceptedCombination.","action":"applied","change":"odrl:permission [ a odrl:Permission ;\n        odrl:action dalicc:exceptedCombination ] ;\n"},{"rubric":3,"severity":"info","field":"odrl:permission","description":"Every permission of GPL-2.0-or-later is kept, in the same place and with the same duties. An exception adds an additional permission to a licence; it never takes a granted right away.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":4,"severity":"info","field":"odrl:prohibition","description":"The exception lets the combined result travel under other terms, and the vocabulary cannot say that of a part of a work. The exception says of the configure scripts: \"You need not follow the terms of the GNU General Public License when using or distributing such scripts, even though portions of the text of Autoconf appear in them.\" A dalicc:ChangeLicense permission would say the licence of the covered work itself may be replaced, which is false and would contradict the whole-work share-alike duty. The record therefore keeps the prohibition, states the narrowed reach in dalicc:reciprocityScope and quotes the clause. Proposed term: dalicc:combinedWorkRelicensing, a permission for putting a larger work that contains the covered material under other terms.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":5,"severity":"info","field":"odrl:duty","description":"The licence-wide cc:ShareAlike duty and the source-code, attribution and notice duties stay where the base record puts them. The exception lifts them for the output of the program, not for the program, so no duty moves.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":6,"severity":"info","field":"dalicc:additionalClauses","description":"The exception text is quoted verbatim as one literal, taken from https://raw.githubusercontent.com/spdx/license-list-data/main/text/Autoconf-exception-2.0.txt. Line breaks and the indentation of the source file are collapsed to single spaces, which is how every clause literal in the library is written; the wording is untouched. The warranty disclaimer and the liability limitation are the ones the base record quotes from the base licence.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":7,"severity":"info","field":"cc:jurisdiction","description":"cc:jurisdiction stays dalicc:worldwide and dalicc:validityType stays dalicc:perpetual: the exception names no territory and no term. The termination clause of the base licence still applies, and the record says no more about it than the base record does.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":8,"severity":"gap","field":"dalicc:exceptedCombination","description":"The exception carves the combination out of the condition of the licence, not out of its grant. dalicc:exemptedMaterial says the opposite and is prohibited on OGL-UK-1.0, OGL-UK-2.0 and NLOD-2.0, where it means material the licence never granted. The vocabulary defines dalicc:exceptedCombination for this side of it since 2026-09-23, and the record carries it as a permission.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":8,"severity":"gap","field":"dalicc:additionalClauses","description":"The exception is conditional on what a modified Autoconf can copy into its output: \"If your modification has such potential, you must delete any notice of this special exception to the GPL from your modified version.\" The vocabulary has no way to say that an additional permission falls away when the licensee changes the work in a named way. Proposed term: dalicc:exceptionVoidingCondition, an annotation holding the circumstance that ends the exception.","action":"none"},{"rubric":9,"severity":"info","field":"record","description":"app.services.composer.consistency_check with the default dependency graph reports 0 conflicts for this record. dalicc:exceptedCombination takes part in no dependency relation, so it neither creates nor hides one.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":10,"severity":"major","field":"dalicc:variantOf","description":"The base record of this variant is GPL-2.0-or-later, which this same addition creates. The model is copied from it statement for statement, so dalicc:orLaterVersionOption stays true for the clause GPL version 2 section 9 states: \"If the Program specifies a version number of this License which applies to it and \"any later version\", you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.\" dalicc:variantOf points at GPL-2.0-or-later and not at GPL-2.0-only, although the two carry the same deontic model. Both records are new, so a second reader should read them together.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":10,"severity":"info","field":"record","description":"The nearest siblings are GPL-2.0-or-later, which this record copies, and GPL-3.0-or-later-with-Autoconf-exception-3.0, which pairs the later licence with the later exception. The two exceptions reach the same result in different words: version 2.0 exempts the configure scripts by name, version 3.0 exempts \"output of Autoconf\" and defines which code counts as normally copied.","action":"applied"},{"rubric":4,"severity":"minor","field":"odrl:prohibition","description":"dalicc:promote was prohibited and no sentence of this text supports it. The statement was the library's reading of a legal default, that a copyright licence which says nothing about endorsement grants no right to it, and it sat in 519 of 581 records as a house convention. That reading is now an adopted dalicc:DefaultRule of the core dependency graph, which supplies it to every licence that is silent about the action, so a compatibility check reaches the same answer and the record states only what the text states. Removed on 2026-09-23; see section 13 of docs/LICENSE_REVIEW.md.","action":"applied","change":"# removed\nodrl:prohibition [ a odrl:Prohibition ;\n        odrl:action dalicc:promote ] ;\n"}],"family":"GNU copyleft family (GPL, LGPL, AGPL, FDL)","port_of":null,"variant_kind":"exception","variant_of":"GPL-2.0-or-later","notes":"The exception text says what the GPL still governs: \"The GNU General Public License (GPL) does govern all other use of the material that constitutes the Autoconf program.\" That sentence is the source of dalicc:reciprocityScope."}