“Oopsies!” FreeBSD Devs Say There’s Still GPL in the Kernel - FOSS Force
Press "Enter" to skip to content
Upcoming Linux, Open Source, and Free Software Events
ATO Meetup – The State of Tech & AI Jobs
Wednesday, August 5, 2026
The Barn at Bandwidth; 2230 Bandmate Way; Raleigh, NC 27607
Meetup
gRPConf North America
Thursday, September 3, 2026
Computer History Museum; 401 N Shoreline Blvd; Mountain View, CA 94043
Conference
AGNTCon + MCPCon 2026 Japan
Thursday, September 10, 2026
Belle Salle Shibuya Garden; B1F/1F, Sumitomo Fudosan Shibuya Garden Tower; 16-17 Nanpeidaicho, Shibuya-ku, Tokyo; 150-0036, Japan
Conference
Nextcloud Community Conference 2026
Saturday, September 19, 2026
CIC Berlin; CIC Berlin Lohmühlenstraße 65; 12435 Berlin-Bezirk Treptow-Köpenick
Conference
OpenSearchCon North America
Tuesday, September 22, 2026
San Jose Marriott 301 South Market Street San Jose, CA 95113
Conference
“Oopsies!” FreeBSD Devs Say There’s Still GPL in the Kernel
By Christine Hall on July 29, 2026 | Licensing and Operating Systems
FreeBSD thought it had scrubbed all GPL code, but a few kernel leftovers remained.
Not so fast, FreeBSD! Thar still be GPL.
A couple of weeks back we told you that the folks at FreeBSD had removed all GPL code from their operating system to keep the world safe for devs with copyleft allergies. The OS was thought to be GPL-free after the removal of dpv, a toolset that contains the GPL tool ‘dialog.’
That’s evidently important to BSD folks, who think that software freedom means the freedom to make it private.
If you're finding this article useful, please consider supporting our work through our FOSS Force Independence 2026 fundraiser.
Unfortunately, the dev team at FreeBSD left some other GPL code behind, so the GPL still lurks, sprinkled in the FreeBSD kernel, of all places. It’s in a header file that was copy and pasted from the Linux kernel for Qualcomm SoCs. There are also some GPLv2 snippets in the Device Tree.
There is some good news for those wanting a GPL-free BSD: most of the GPL pieces in the kernel are also licensed under BSD, which means they don’t count for this purpose.
As for me, I think it’s amusing that somebody finds it so important to not be copyleft. It reminds me of Microsoft under Ballmer.
Christine Hall<br>Christine Hall has been a journalist since 1971. In 2001, she began writing a weekly consumer computer column and started covering Linux and FOSS in 2002 after making the switch to GNU/Linux. Follow her on Twitter: @BrideOfLinux
FOSSForce.com
Published in Licensing and Operating Systems
More from LicensingMore posts in Licensing "<br>Elon to Open Source X’s Codebase. Believe It When Git Happens<br>Elon to Open Source X’s Codebase. Believe It When Git Happens<br>FreeBSD 16 Cleans House: No GPL Left in the Base System<br>FreeBSD 16 Cleans House: No GPL Left in the Base System
More from Operating SystemsMore posts in Operating Systems "<br>FreeBSD 16 Cleans House: No GPL Left in the Base System<br>FreeBSD 16 Cleans House: No GPL Left in the Base System<br>The Quiet Clause That May Save Linux From Age‑Verification Laws<br>The Quiet Clause That May Save Linux From Age‑Verification Laws
Be First to Comment
Leave a Reply<br>Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *
Comment
Name (optional)
Email (optional)
Website
Trending on FOSS Force
“Oopsies!” FreeBSD Devs Say There’s Still GPL in the Kernel<br>by Christine Hall
How to Run Windows Apps on Linux Using Bottles<br>by Jack Wallen
LibreOffice 26.2.5 Demotes Skia Rendering for Mac and Windows<br>by Christine Hall
Fedora 44 Brings GNOME 50, KDE 6.6, and Better Gaming (With Screenshots)<br>by Larry Cafiero
GNU Binutils 2.47 Released With New Linker, Disassembler Options<br>by Christine Hall
Search Our Site
Unicorn Media