Sort this out please. Background. squashfs-tools-nt had/has a statement I consider defamatory to me as maintainer of Squashfs-tools. He also made defamatory statements on your mailing list.
See: https://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/msg1690835.html I asked if the Debian package repeated this libel, and it apparently does. See below. Your maintainer than repeats the assertion that I am a dormant maintainer. This I consider extremely inappropriate and an additional libel and provocation. I am not sending these emails out of choice. In over 30+ years of open source development this is the first time I have had to do so. But on-line false statements are dangerous - if they are not dealt with, they have a tendency to become widely believed as fact. I am still the maintainer of Squashfs (both in the kernel and of the tools), and I have never believed or indicated otherwise. I have been active over the last couple of years, submitting kernel patches and bug fixes to the squashfs-tools, and dealing with issues and pull requests and emails. I will offer a couple of URLs below, but, I do not believe I need to prove myself here, quite the opposite. https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=a3f94cb99a854fa381fe7fadd97c4f61633717a5 GitHub repository https://github.com/plougher/squashfs-tools I will freely admit I have not been as active as I used to be - mainly concentrating on essential security fixes, bug fixes and correspondence. But there is a big difference between this and being "shamed" publicly as an inactive and dormant maintainer. It is this which I object to most strongly, and I consider defamatory. This reduction in involvement has not been out of choice, but as a consequence of taking on demanding roles in my day job. I am currently the Kernel Maintainer for Redhat Enterprise Linux 8 (and have been for RHEL5 and RHEL6), this is a job where spare time is more a concept than a reality. So I have worked extremely hard keeping my level of involvement in Squashfs. I do not have any more to say, except I take damage to my reputation seriously. I hope this situation can be resolved amicably. Dr Phillip Lougher Squashfs Author and Maintainer --------- Forwarded message --------- From: Phillip Lougher <[email protected]> Date: Sun, Jul 28, 2019 at 2:42 PM Subject: Re: Bug#931965: New Debian package squashfs-tools-ng_0.4.2 To: László Böszörményi (GCS) <[email protected]> On Sun, Jul 28, 2019 at 11:30 AM László Böszörményi (GCS) <[email protected]> wrote: > > Dear Phillip, > > On Sun, Jul 28, 2019 at 5:18 AM Phillip Lougher > <[email protected]> wrote: > > I notice you have produced a new package squashfs-tools-ng_0.4.2. > I have packaged it and uploaded for review of our FTP Master team. > They are going to check if all files have a license that's acceptable > as free software according to our guidelines. > > > I have not been able to find any download of that package available. > No one can download the package until the mentioned check is over. > > > Can you confirm that this package does not repeat the libel contained > > in the upstream package? > David removed that text from his Git tree. As this is the latest > release and before that removal, it's still contains the sentences > that you thought to be inactive and the squashfs-tools development > seemed to be stalled. > > > Additionally this page > > > > https://ftp-master.debian.org/new/squashfs-tools-ng_0.4.2-1.html > > > > In the "Description" contains two paragraphs lifted from my > > Squashfs-tools repository without attribution which I consider a > > copyright violation. > > > > "Squashfs is a highly compressed read-only filesystem for Linux. It uses > > zlib > > compression to compress both files, inodes and directories. Inodes in the > > system are very small and all blocks are packed to minimise data overhead. > > Block sizes greater than 4K are supported up to a maximum of 64K. > > . > > Squashfs is intended for general read-only filesystem use, for archival use > > (i.e. in cases where a .tar.gz file may be used), and in constrained block > > device/memory systems (e.g. embedded systems) where low overhead is > > needed." > If you ask about if I credited you for this paragraph in > debian/copyright then forgive me but not yet. I can ask the FTP > Masters to reject the current package and I'm going to re-upload with > that added. > @David may even write a new description for his squashfs-tools-ng project. > > > Dr Phillip Lougher > > Squashfs author and maintainer > With all the respect, I don't know you are such upset and against > this new tool. If I look around, it seemed you are a dormant > developer. > You didn't update your homepage[1], even today it still states > "Squashfs 4.2 released (28th February 2011)" and "Squashfs 4.2 This is > the latest release, for users of 2.6.29 and later kernels". No mention > of the real latest release, 4.3 [2]. > I don't see any announcement either where you present the new > development on GitHub. Quickly checking the commit logs, it reveals > that you only fixed security vulnerabilities 13 days ago[3] when these > were publicly reported four years ago (on July 20th, 2015)[4]. > Then David announced _twice_ squashfs-tools-ng on _your_ mailing > list[5][6] without any comment from you. Now all of a sudden you are > against him because he (me and lot of people included) thought you are > inactive[7]. That is also offensive and I also consider it a libel. Do not dig your hold any deeper, or else I will take legal advice with an intention to sue. Phillip > Just for the record, did you contact Gentoo as well? They already > distribute squashfs-tools-ng[8] with the text you label as > "defamatory". > > @FTP Masters: please reject the package if it's really a copyright > infringement using a text description from an other package without > crediting that in our copyright file. > > Kind regards, > Laszlo/GCS > [1] http://squashfs.sourceforge.net/ > [2] https://sourceforge.net/projects/squashfs/files/squashfs/squashfs4.3/ > [3] > https://github.com/plougher/squashfs-tools/commit/f95864afe8833fe3ad782d714b41378e860977b1 > [4] https://lwn.net/Vulnerabilities/651775/ > [5] https://sourceforge.net/p/squashfs/mailman/message/36689846/ > [6] https://sourceforge.net/p/squashfs/mailman/message/36709722/ > [7] https://github.com/AgentD/squashfs-tools-ng/issues/10 > [8] > https://gitweb.gentoo.org/repo/gentoo.git/commit/?id=5ae739228d96e5857b88c0658d22456da1724ea0
