Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Santiago Vila]

> Santiago Vila wrote:
> > > Another thing which I think would solve this issue easily, but which
> > > may have some side effects I'm not yet aware of, would be to rename
> > > the file to "Artistic-1.0-Perl" (or whatever) and make "Artistic" a
> > > symlink to it, analogous how it's done for the different GPL versions.
> > 
> > That would be a possibility to which I'm not opposed in principle,
> 
> Happy to hear.
> 
> Do we need a minor/wishlist bug to track this?

Against debian-policy. See the base-files FAQ.


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Axel Beckert]

Hi again,

thanks for fixing this so quickly.

Santiago Vila wrote:
> > Another thing which I think would solve this issue easily, but which
> > may have some side effects I'm not yet aware of, would be to rename
> > the file to "Artistic-1.0-Perl" (or whatever) and make "Artistic" a
> > symlink to it, analogous how it's done for the different GPL versions.
> 
> That would be a possibility to which I'm not opposed in principle,

Happy to hear.

Do we need a minor/wishlist bug to track this?

> but for now I'm just going to clarify what we currently have without
> doing any major changes.

Yeah, bad time for opening pandora's box. Needed to be done, though.
:-)

> This is really a more complex problem

Definitely.

> and it should ideally be solved by the policy group, as they are who
> really decide about the contents of common-licenses (there is a
> question in the base-files FAQ about this).

*nod*

Niko Tyni wrote:
> For the record, I intend to scan at least the 3000 pkg-perl packages
> to see how common the Artistic license variants are and how they are
> reflected in debian/copyright files.

Thanks! So I can remove that from my TODO list again. :-)

If you don't intent to post the results on debian-perl@ldo, I'd be
happy if you could keep me in the line as I intent to write a lintian
test for the Artistic license differences after having had a look at
the results of this/your check.

> There's quite some possibility for errors in debian/copyright
> declarations due to confusion between the variants.

Yep. I think, we're lucky that /u/s/c-l/Artistic is the Perl one as
most perl modules are licensed "under the same terms as Perl".

> This should also help us estimate whether the variants might warrant
> addition in base-files.

Indeed. Good point.

Regards, Axel (happy that this didn't cause too much havoc :-)
-- 
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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Niko Tyni]

On Thu, Oct 09, 2014 at 08:19:42PM +0200, Santiago Vila wrote:

> This is really a more complex problem and it should ideally be solved
> by the policy group, as they are who really decide about the contents
> of common-licenses (there is a question in the base-files FAQ about
> this).

Right.

For the record, I intend to scan at least the 3000 pkg-perl packages
to see how common the Artistic license variants are and how they are
reflected in debian/copyright files. There's quite some possibility
for errors in debian/copyright declarations due to confusion between
the variants.

This should also help us estimate whether the variants might warrant
addition in base-files.
-- 
Niko Tyni   nt...@debian.org


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Santiago Vila]

On Thu, Oct 09, 2014 at 05:27:55PM +0200, Axel Beckert wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> Santiago Vila wrote:
> > I'll try to document this in the next version, but not in the README
> > as it has been suggested. This deserves a place in the copyright file
> > itself, below the line saying "The GNU Public Licenses [...]".
> 
> I must admit, I haven't looked in the debian/copyright file, but I
> think someone on IRC had that idea, too.
> 
> Another thing which I think would solve this issue easily, but which
> may have some side effects I'm not yet aware of, would be to rename
> the file to "Artistic-1.0-Perl" (or whatever) and make "Artistic" a
> symlink to it, analogous how it's done for the different GPL versions.

That would be a possibility to which I'm not opposed in principle, but
for now I'm just going to clarify what we currently have without doing
any major changes.

This is really a more complex problem and it should ideally be solved
by the policy group, as they are who really decide about the contents
of common-licenses (there is a question in the base-files FAQ about
this).

Thanks.


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Axel Beckert]

Hi,

Santiago Vila wrote:
> I'll try to document this in the next version, but not in the README
> as it has been suggested. This deserves a place in the copyright file
> itself, below the line saying "The GNU Public Licenses [...]".

I must admit, I haven't looked in the debian/copyright file, but I
think someone on IRC had that idea, too.

Another thing which I think would solve this issue easily, but which
may have some side effects I'm not yet aware of, would be to rename
the file to "Artistic-1.0-Perl" (or whatever) and make "Artistic" a
symlink to it, analogous how it's done for the different GPL versions.

Regards, Axel
-- 
 ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert , http://people.debian.org/~abe/
: :' :  |  Debian Developer, ftp.ch.debian.org Admin
`. `'   |  1024D: F067 EA27 26B9 C3FC 1486  202E C09E 1D89 9593 0EDE
  `-|  4096R: 2517 B724 C5F6 CA99 5329  6E61 2FF9 CD59 6126 16B5


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Santiago Vila]

I'll try to document this in the next version, but not in the README
as it has been suggested. This deserves a place in the copyright file
itself, below the line saying "The GNU Public Licenses [...]".

Thanks for the report.


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Axel Beckert]

Hi Russ,

Russ Allbery wrote:
> > neither inside /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic nor in
> > /usr/share/doc/base-files/README nor in
> > /usr/share/doc/base-files/changelog.gz is declared (or even hinted)
> > which version or variant of "The Artistic License" is shipped in
> > /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic.
> 
> > According to https://spdx.org/licenses/ there are at least five
> > registered versions and variants of the Artistic License:
> 
> >   * Artistic License 1.0
> >   * Artistic License 1.0 (Perl)
> 
> What does SPDX think the difference between these two is?

Actually quite a lot. :-(

Artistic-1.0.txt Artistic-1.0-cl8.txt only differ in that added 8th
clause. But Artistic-1.0-Perl.txt differs more from both -- and seems
to also include that new 8th clause, slightly modified, too.

Niko Tyni noticed on IRC yesterday evening that there are at least two
different variants of the "Artistic License" because of the different
number of clauses (9 vs 10). I digged deeper after that comment and
this bug report is the result of that digging.

Here's the wdiff (as a normal diff doesn't help much on changed words.
Piping it through colordiff helps a lot, otherwise look for the
strings "[-" and "{+". It's based on a checkout of
http://git.spdx.org/?p=license-list.git

→ wdiff Artistic-1.0.txt Artistic-1.0-Perl.txt | colordiff
The [-Artistic License-] {+"Artistic License"+}

Preamble

The intent of this document is to state the conditions under which a Package 
may be copied, such that the Copyright Holder maintains some semblance of 
artistic control over the development of the package, while giving the users of 
the package the right to use and distribute the Package in a more-or-less 
customary fashion, plus the right to make reasonable modifications.

Definitions:

 "Package" refers to the collection of files distributed by the Copyright 
Holder, and derivatives of that collection of files created through textual 
modification.

 "Standard Version" refers to such a Package if it has not been modified, 
or has been modified in accordance with the wishes of the Copyright [-Holder.-] 
{+Holder as specified below.+}

 "Copyright Holder" is whoever is named in the copyright or copyrights for 
the package.

 "You" is you, if you're thinking about copying or distributing this 
Package.

 "Reasonable copying fee" is whatever you can justify on the basis of media 
cost, duplication charges, time of people involved, and so on.  (You will not 
be required to justify it to the Copyright Holder, but only to the computing 
community at large as a market that must bear the fee.)

 "Freely Available" means that no fee is charged for the item itself, 
though there may be fees involved in handling the item. It also means that 
recipients of the item may redistribute it under the same conditions they 
received it.

1. You may make and give away verbatim copies of the source form of the 
Standard Version of this Package without restriction, provided that you 
duplicate all of the original copyright notices and associated disclaimers.

2. You may apply bug fixes, portability fixes and other modifications derived 
from the Public Domain or from the Copyright Holder.  A Package modified in 
such a way shall still be considered the Standard Version.

3. You may otherwise modify your copy of this Package in any way, provided that 
you insert a prominent notice in each changed file stating how and when you 
changed that file, and provided that you do at least ONE of the following:

 a) place your modifications in the Public Domain or otherwise make them 
Freely Available, such as by posting said modifications to Usenet or an 
equivalent medium, or placing the modifications on a major archive site such as 
[-ftp.uu.net,-] {+uunet.uu.net,+} or by allowing the Copyright Holder to 
include your modifications in the Standard Version of the Package.
 b) use the modified Package only within your corporation or organization.
 c) rename any non-standard executables so the names do not conflict with 
standard executables, which must also be provided, and provide a separate 
manual page for each non-standard executable that clearly documents how it 
differs from the Standard Version.
 d) make other distribution arrangements with the Copyright Holder.

4. You may distribute the programs of this Package in object code or executable 
form, provided that you do at least ONE of the following:

 a) distribute a Standard Version of the executables and library files, 
together with instructions (in the manual page or equivalent) on where to get 
the Standard Version.
 b) accompany the distribution with the machine-readable source of the 
Package with your modifications.
 c) [-accompany any non-standard executables with their corresponding 
Standard Version executables, giving the-] {+give+} non-standard executables 
non-standard names, and clearly [-documenting-] {+document+} the differences

Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Russ Allbery]

Axel Beckert  writes:

> neither inside /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic nor in
> /usr/share/doc/base-files/README nor in
> /usr/share/doc/base-files/changelog.gz is declared (or even hinted)
> which version or variant of "The Artistic License" is shipped in
> /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic.

> According to https://spdx.org/licenses/ there are at least five
> registered versions and variants of the Artistic License:

>   * Artistic License 1.0
>   * Artistic License 1.0 (Perl)

What does SPDX think the difference between these two is?  The original
Artistic License was the one that shipped with Perl, so I'm confused about
what the difference would be.

> Please clearly state inside the file

We should not modify the license texts included in common-licenses.  The
files contain exactly the license text as distributed by the author of the
license.  That's a nice property that we should not be changing.

There's no harm in spelling out which one is intended in README, though.

-- 
Russ Allbery (r...@debian.org)   


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Bug#764553: base-files: Does neither state which version nor which variant of the Artistic License is in /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

[Axel Beckert]

Package: base-files
Version: 7.5
Severity: important

Dear Santiago,

neither inside /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic nor in
/usr/share/doc/base-files/README nor in
/usr/share/doc/base-files/changelog.gz is declared (or even hinted)
which version or variant of "The Artistic License" is shipped in
/usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic.

According to https://spdx.org/licenses/ there are at least five
registered versions and variants of the Artistic License:

  * Artistic License 1.0
  * Artistic License 1.0 (Perl)
  * Artistic License 1.0 w/clause 8
  * Artistic License 2.0
  * Clarified Artistic License

According to "dwdiff -c", our /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic is
actually the "Artistic License 1.0 (Perl)" license.

Please clearly state inside the file but also in the README which
version and variant of the Artistic License is shipped with the package.

A bit of background about some of the variants and versions is at
http://opensource.org/licenses/Artistic-1.0 as well as at
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artistic_License

-- System Information:
Debian Release: jessie/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (990, 'unstable'), (600, 'testing'), (110, 'experimental'), (109, 
'buildd-unstable'), (109, 'buildd-experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 3.16-trunk-amd64 (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=C.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=C.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages base-files depends on:
ii  gawk [awk]  1:4.1.1+dfsg-1
ii  mawk [awk]  1.3.3-17

base-files recommends no packages.

base-files suggests no packages.

-- no debconf information


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