GPL: Does changing makefiles and configurations considered as &quot;modifications&quot;?
<p>I know that editing GPL source code is considered as a "modification", which means all the copyleft rules apply.</p>

<p>However, most software includes configuration files and makefiles which you can tweak before rebuilding.  Does that count as modification?</p>

<p>For example, I am using the <code>swupdate</code> package through Yocto.  I override the <code>meta-swupdate</code> layer to specify specific configurations (e.g. <code>CONFIG_LUA_PARSER=y</code> to enable LUA parser), and then build swupdate. </p>

<p>Section 1 of the <a href="https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">GPLv3</a> states:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The “Corresponding Source” for a work in object code form means <strong>all
  the source code needed to generate</strong>, install, and (for an executable
  work) run the object code and to modify the work, <strong>including scripts to
  control those activities.</strong></p>
  
  <p>The Corresponding Source need not include anything that users can
  regenerate automatically from other parts of the Corresponding Source.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>So <code>Makefile</code>s are clearly included if they exists.</p>

<p>The point of the GPL is to let the user be free to modify the code. A lot of projects are very hard to modify without the scripts used to fetch dependencies &amp; build the executable so not providing means to build the code would go against the license spirit.</p>

gpl