Last modified: 2014-11-19 20:48:25 UTC
Bug 26280 was about PHP files missing the GPL header which is the license used by MediaWiki core. To avoid having to reopen the original bug, we would need a lint check script that would make sure any file added to the repo contains the GPL headers.
Ubuntu package `devscripts` provides a `licensecheck` tool which we might use on submitted files.
We'd want to provide an exception for the includes/libs/ directory, some of which are purposefully licensed under non-GPL licenses.
I'd say catch it through code review and maybe scan occasionally. I don't think it's worth the overhead to try and automate this. I haven't seen any other major projects do this either.