Why documentation and programs should be treated alike (was Re: Unidentified subject!)
RMS wote: For the sake of avoiding confusion, please note that I use software in the meaning I believe is standard, referring to computer programs only. This is not what I believe to be the standard meaning or the historically correct meaning, but thanks for avoiding confusion. The main difference between a program and documentation is that a program does something, while documentation is passive; By this argument, source code to a program (of the sort which must be compiled to run) is not a program. And can therefore, in your opinion be encumbered by unlimited numbers of Invariant Sections (presumably in 'mandatory comments') while remaining free, as long as they can be removed from the actual executable binary, I suppose. Correct? Furthermore, a manual in any markup format (LaTeX, HTML, info, texinfo) is not passive: it does something, namely generating the actual manual in the intended-to-read format (printed, visible on screen in 'info' or 'mozilla', etc.) So manuals in any markup format -- including all the GNU manuals -- are thus akin to programs, and should be judged by those criteria. Correct? This is far from a bright-line distinction. It's such a fuzzy distinction that's it's probably not useful at all. Another difference is that distribution of programs on paper is rare, and not an important case to consider, whereas distribution of documentation on paper is a very important case. OK, so this is an actual distinction. I will concede that the clauses which apply *only* to distribution of printed copies may be defensible in this way. Another difference is that the you can see the words of the text in the manual, whereas you cannot see the source code in the executable of a program. LaTeX markup vs. PostScript output? Some stuff in the source code is visible in the 'final' version; other stuff isn't. (Much the same is true with programs.) Not a real difference. For software, the danger is that the source won't be available at all. The same danger *does* exist for manuals. For instance, distributing only the postscript or 'dvi' version of a manual written in TeX. For manuals, there is a real danger that the source will be in a format that free software cannot read, and thus useless. The same danger *does* exist for programs, and happens often: a 'free' program written in an interpreted language with no free interpreter or translator is effectively non-free in exactly the same way. Yet there is no similar clause in the GPL. This is why we designed the requirement for transparent copies. Which is very poorly drafted (it seems to effectively prohibit any source format which is not hand-written in a text editor), but not a fundamental point of disagreement. Another difference is that DRM systems to stop people from accessing documents are a real threat to our freedom, and we need to try to push against them in any way we can. Not a difference. They're being applied to programs too. And from earlier in the message: I would rather ask why they should be the same, since they deal with different situations. I have explained this before, and I will repeat it. Programs and program documentation are inherently linked; transfer between them is essential and basic. Literate programming styles encourage documentation to be extracted directly from program source code, and documentation to be embedded directly in program source code. Even when this is not done, documentation on a computer routinely has source code which is compiled into an 'executable' version, just like programs. Every issue which has come up relating to freeness of programs has turned out to apply to documentation on a computer, and every issue relating to freeness of documentation on a computer has turned out to apply to programs. --Nathanael
Re: Unidentified subject!
RMS wrote: The GNU Project's motive for using invariant sections is not the issue here; that's a GNU Project decision, not a Debian decision. Out of curiosity, where *is* it the issue? As a GNU Project contributor who disapproves of GFDL Invariant Sections, and knowing quite a few other GNU Project contributors and members who feel the same way, where should we attempt to be heard so as to have some influence on the GNU Project as a whole? -- Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Re: Some licensing questions regarding celestia
Sorry it took me so long to get back to you; I was out of town on an emergency. I wrote: So, what do you recommend for someone who really *wants* to put something in the public domain? Rick Moen wrote: Do you intend that as a real, non-rhetorical question? If so, I Yes. recommend BSD licence with no advertising clause (or MIT/X). I mean, Not good enough. I don't want to require that subsequent users reproduce a copyright notice or a license text *at all*. I want to waive *all* rights which I have as a consequence of copyright. (I do want to retain any *non-copyright*, non-trade-secret rights I may happen to have.) why would you _not_ want the shield against warranty claims? That's not the issue, the above is. Do you think that if *I* include a warranty disclaimer, but do not *require* all subsequent redistributors to include one, that *I* would be liable (rather than the subsequent redistributor who failed to include one)? If so, I'd love to know why. And if that person objects that, no, he really, really wants to destroy his copyright and make the code be actually (or at least effectively but for certain so) public domain, then I would advise him that it's an imperfect world, and nobody knows how to do that without the risk of creating very troublesome legal questions for the remaining duration of the copyright term. Well, that's a non-answer. There's absolutely no reason an effective public domain license shouldn't be possible. I haven't seen one yet though. Oddly enough, a UK acquaintance of mine (from OSI license-discuss) was in contact with several of the notables (including Prof. Lessig) whose names are cited as founders, to see if they endorsed such site contents as the Public Domain Dedication at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/ . He reports[2] that they do not, and apparently the matter is the subject of some controversy. I have not yet inquired with them directly, though I may get around to doing so. Interesting. I wrote: No such thing. Warranties are incurred by distribution and stuff like that, not by ownership. Rick Moen wrote: (Please note that my use of the term owner was intended to connote author or issuer, in this context.) Ah... owner meant copyright holder to me. :-) If you are trying to assert that being the identifiable author of a piece of code that is claimed to have done harm would not subject you to liability claims, I would suggest you are mistaken. If I wrote it and kept it secret; and it was distributed without my authorization; and used to cause harm, I am quite sure I would not be subject to any liability claims. Or if I would be, then the legal system is totally off the wall. But we're getting off the topic. -- Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
On Sun, 21 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: If you are aware of the existence of unmodifyable essays and logos in debian main, please file an RC bug against the package in question. You seem to be saying that if our political statements, which are included as invariant sections, could be removed from our manuals, you would make a point of removing them. No, I'm saying if you are aware of statements which cannot be removed in packages, plesae file an RC bug against the package containing them so the problem can be addressed. We're all human here, I think, and we occasionally miss parts of packages that are licensed in a manner that is not free under the DFSG. In other words, the fact that such unmodifyable, non-DFSG free statements exist in Debian doesn't mean that we have intentionally left them in Debian. If you make us aware of them, we will attempt to resolve the problem. A few weeks ago someone was trying to argue that nobody would do this, and that invariant sections were designed to solve a nonexistent problem. Now we know the problem is not just theoretical. No, it's still a theoretical problem.[1] The above has nothing to do with the content of the statements themselves, merely the fact that they are not free under the DFSG. If it's still not clear, please respond so I can clarify further. Don Armstrong 1: I think most package maintainers (or at least, I) try to keep their packages as close to pristine upstream as possible while making sure they can be distributed by Debian and play correctly with other packages. Removing documentation isn't something that is typically done. -- When I was a kid I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realised that the Lord doesn't work that way so I stole one and asked Him to forgive me. -- Emo Philips. http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgpOX8n3xZKev.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Some licensing questions regarding celestia
Quoting Anthony DeRobertis ([EMAIL PROTECTED]): Why not do something like: statement (maybe) releasing work to public domain If the above is not legally possible, then (name[s]) grant(s) you and any other party receiving this code a perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free license to [everything copyright law prohibits]. This is great, except that I think we need a list here of everything copyright law prohibits! Which is well beyone my ability, given the numerous expansions in copyright law! (name[s]) additionally grant(s) you a royalty-free... license to do anything else that you would be allowed to do with a work in the public domain. It is the intent of (name[s]) that this work be treated as if the public domain statement above is valid. What would be wrong with that? Best case, it is public domain; worst case, it is public domain in all but name. I'd like to nail it as open as humanly possible, so I'd like to apply to to anyone receiving a derivative work based on the work as well, unless there's a legal complication in that. Rick Moen said: I like it; it would probably work (my guess). The only thing wrong with it is there's no exclusion of warranties and damages, a la BSD or MIT/X I still can't for the life of me understand why anyone would _not_ want those on a work one is handing out for free, but to each his own. Issuing a warranty disclaimer is fine and good. Requiring subsequent users to reproduce your warranty disclaimer is worth avoiding in a public-domain-in-all-but-name license. :-) (The warranty disclaimer is not really part of the license proper.) Perhaps we can polish up the above license draft and turn it into the Effective Public Domain License? Then push it at Creative Commons? :-) --Nathanael Nerode
Re: What does GFDL do?
On Sun, 21 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: There's a critical difference here. The GPL can accompany the reference card. The invariant material must be in the reference card. I explained months ago, and again last week, why this is not so. I must have missed that explanation. Can you provide a reference to it? From a relatively strict reading of the license, however, I see no indication of a method which you could distribute the reference card with the license and invariant sections not merely accompanying, but affixed. Perhaps you or someone else could walk through and explain the verbiage of the license that allows one to do this? [The closest I came was removing a single document from a collection of documents, but then you have to follow the rules applying to verbatim copying, which doesn't seem to grant us anything usefull.] Don Armstrong -- Of course Pacman didn't influence us as kids. If it did, we'd be running around in darkened rooms, popping pills and listening to repetitive music. http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgp4EUIFepCj9.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
I said: 2. The GFDL prevents you from using the technical material in the manual in nearly any program, because most programs don't have a lot of the specific things the GFDL refers to (section titles, etc.), so there's no legally clear way to satisfy its requirements. RMS said: I don't think that section titles are a problem--it would not be hard to put them in a program. In a *binary executable* ?!?! That's what I'm talking about here. Anyway, the troublesome terms are named appendix, front-matter section; titles and title of sections or named subunits; and Title Page (defined as the text near the most prominent appearance of the work's title, preceding the beginning of the body of the text, which doesn't help, and does not make sense for anything consisting of multiple 'parallel' files). Would dumping ELF sections into the executable with the correct titles and contents perhaps qualify? ;-) -- Nathanael Nerode neroden at gcc.gnu.org http://home.twcny.rr.com/nerode/neroden/fdl.html
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-21 21:15:25 +0100 Richard Braakman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: No, that's not a logical conclusion. It's [...] slippery slope fallacy. It's no less a fallacy than claiming software is controversial and worthy of special definition. Software is not a controversial word in English (roughly inverse of hardware in one sense). Some people advocate a bizarre definition of it in order to further their agenda. If you're going to define common words just because someone objects to the normal meaning being used, you'll get some bozo that objects to the word social and claims it only applies to the welfare state. That's clearly ungood. Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Anthony DeRobertis [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Sunday, Sep 21, 2003, at 03:18 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: The essays and logos in question are in fact not part of Debian. But some of them are produced by Debian. Which essays does Debian have that aren't free? If there are any, I think that should be fixed. As far as the logo, the name Mathieu Roy isn't free in the DFSG-sense. Neither is the Debian name. I don't see why the Debian logo should be either. I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Sunday 21 September 2003 19:55, Mathieu Roy wrote: I do not consider a bug as a philosophical failure but a technical one. Did you really pass PP ? And you? A bug is an error, not something made on purpose. There are others words for this kind of problem. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-21 18:55:00 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I do not consider a bug as a philosophical failure but a technical one. This makes no sense. You said that GNU always follows its rules, while I corrected you because some GNU projects have erroneously included non-free software in the past. With your strange habbit of cutting a phrase from its context, it's impossible to discuss seriously. What is your point, that some people at GNU made some mistakes? Probably, like everywhere else on earth. So what? -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Anthony DeRobertis [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Sunday, Sep 21, 2003, at 03:20 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: But is the upstream author of these *Bugs*. Does it means that Debian have an implicit policy which is making non-free software is ok unless you distribute it? I'm not sure what your asking, but I think it'd be safe to say Debian strongly believes in the right to private modifications. And do you consider the official logo as a private modification? -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: Unidentified subject!
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-21 23:33:41 +0100 Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Defining all these thing as software is a peculiar way to use the word. Not at all. It is the original and proper meaning, as far as I can tell. It seems to be a neologism created to cover all things stored in the computer, when the WW2-ish phrase stored program was not adequate. The first known use in print is John W Tukey in the January 1958 edition of American Mathematical Monthly, with a short and vague explanation as interpretive routines, compilers, and other aspects, contrasted with hardware. As with any neologism, it may have fuzzed a little, but the contrast with hardware is constant. And do you really think that every software (of your wide definition) you can have on computer is part of the Operating System? The goal of Debian is to provide an Operating System, isn't it? Apparently it's clear that Debian do not consider that his very own logo must be free software -- that's right, you do not need a logo at all to have a complete free operating system. If Debian already recognize that non-program software can be non-free without that being a problem, why refusing to include a documentation that include a non-program software (technical documentation is likely program)? Likewise, in the term Free Software Movement and Free Software Foundation, software refers specifically to computer programs. Our criteria for free software licenses concern licenses for computer programs. I am not familiar with the Free Software Movement organisation and can find no record of it. The Free Software Foundation uses an odd definition of software. Maybe because the software that must be included in a Free Software Operating System is mostly programs and documentation... You've asked me to explain why the criteria for free documentation licenses should be different from free software licenses (or, as you would perhaps put it, free computer program licenses). I would rather ask why they should be the same, since they deal with different situations. Why should they be different? The freedom to adapt other literary works is no less necessary than the freedom to adapt programs. I suspect we have opinions on that, if your views are similar to the other GNU project members who support FDL and have participated on this list. So, you recognize that in fact you want every literary works to be DFSG-compliant, software or not. It totally explains why you need a so broad definition of software. As a matter of fact, you are no longer discussing about an Operating System. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: [OT] Suing for hot coffee
Karl E. Jorgensen [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Sun, Sep 21, 2003 at 07:51:34PM +0200, Mathieu Roy wrote: Walter Landry [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Thomas Bushnell, BSG) wrote: Coffee at 180 degrees is a distinct item from coffee. Coffee is not properly served at 180 degrees What are you talking about? When coffee comes out of a good coffee machine, it is near boiling. Coffee enthusiasts even measure the temperature to make sure that it is extremely hot [1]. My water heater for tea is set at 203, and we serve it right away. McDonalds was far from unreasonable. Is it really 180° Farenheit... or Celsius? In the first case, sure it does seems so hot. 180 Celsius is ... quite hot. Unless you manage to keep it under rather excessive pressure, I guess that you will end up with a dry coffee mug that is difficult to wash. And a lot of steam... If it's 180°C in the coffee machine under some pressure, it can goes around 99°C at the atmopheric pressure in the served closed cup and stay at a very high temperature for long, enough to get seriously burned 5 minutes later. If it's only 100°C in the coffe machine, it will probably go down fastly, too fastly to get serious harm after 5 minutes. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* MJ Ray ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030921 23:19]: Software is not a controversial word in English (roughly inverse of hardware in one sense). Some people advocate a bizarre definition of it in order to further their agenda. If you're going to define common words just because someone objects to the normal meaning being used, Sorry, but at least I understood software at start of discussion more as a synonym to programms, but I'm not a native english speaker. I have however learned that we use the word software (at least) here at Debian as the opposite of hardware, and I'm fine with it. So, it's not true that all people using software as programms are doing it to get better arguments. There are some people that do it, especially if they are not able to adjust their usage of a word to the meaning that's common here. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: Unidentified subject!
Mathieu On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:30:41AM +0200, Mathieu Roy wrote: MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : And do you really think that every software (of your wide definition) you can have on computer is part of the Operating System? The goal of Debian is to provide an Operating System, isn't it? The Social Contract is about producing the Debian system and other works that provide a useful platform for our users. The Operating System is just part of that work. Apparently it's clear that Debian do not consider that his very own logo must be free software -- that's right, you do not need a logo at all to have a complete free operating system. If Debian already recognize that non-program software can be non-free without that being a problem, why refusing to include a documentation that include a non-program software (technical documentation is likely program)? True, recent e-mails show that this is/was a problem. One that is being fixed by making the Debian logo a trademark. Maybe because the software that must be included in a Free Software Operating System is mostly programs and documentation... Agreed, but just and OS is a very limited beast. One needs applications to make the platform do real work. Thus the Debian system. So, you recognize that in fact you want every literary works to be DFSG-compliant, software or not. It totally explains why you need a so broad definition of software. Yes, wouldn't it be much nicer to live in a world where everything is free. As a matter of fact, you are no longer discussing about an Operating System. At last we agree. Steve -- disbar, n: As distinguished from some other bar. pgp2sF1EifJdn.pgp Description: PGP signature
License requirements for DSP binaries?
The mwavem package includes binaries for the Mwave(tm) digital signal processor (DSP) chip found on some ThinkPad(tm). With the binaries installed the Mwave implements a modem. IBM distributes the Linux driver and the binaries in a tarball that it says is licensed under the GPL. http://oss.software.ibm.com/acpmodem/ No source code is provided for the DSP binaries. (N.B., past discussions of this issue have reached the conclusion that such software can nevertheless be distributed in main.) Is the statement that the GPL covers the binaries good enough for Debian, or should we ask IBM for a separate license for the DSP files? -- Thomas Hood [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
* Richard Stallman ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 00:50]: If you are aware of the existence of unmodifyable essays and logos in debian main, please file an RC bug against the package in question. You seem to be saying that if our political statements, which are included as invariant sections, could be removed from our manuals, you would make a point of removing them. If the whole docu would be DFSG-free, than there would be no cause to remove polical statements. And at least I would consider an attempt to remove a DFSG-free political essay from a DFSG-free manual as a severe impoliteness, and would of course try to stop this. Perhaps you should try to differ between have the right to and intend. It's not that some (or most) readers here want to remove your political statements - on contrary, most here are supporting your goals. It's just that Debian requires the freedom to modify. We require that from each software vendor, and also from the FSF. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 08:02]: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Because we require them to be free if we include them in Debian? Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Sun, Sep 21, 2003 at 09:29:54AM -0400, Richard Stallman wrote: The DFSG explicitly codifies my specific decision about TeX,=20 It does nothing of the sort; there is no mention of the word 'TeX' in the DFSG. Section 4 does precisely that, though without mentioning TeX by name. In other words: I can live with Donald Knuth issuing a license in the gray areay between free and non-free. I cannot live with the same thing coming from the FSF. The GFDL is free according to our standards. If you wish to view the matter otherwise, you're entitled to your opinion. Someone else criticized the idea (though no one had proposed it) of giving the FSF special consideration; now you seem to be saying just the opposite, that you believe in giving the FSF less cooperation that you would give to anyone else. No, that's not true. I'm saying that, when it comes to freedom, I expect a higher standard from the FSF than I do from D.E. Knuth. I'm not suggesting we should stop cooperating with the FSF. is that the Debian Project could end up being better friends with the Open Source Initiative than with the FSF; while most Debian Developers and users nowadays think the FSF is a good organization[1], this might change if the FSF insists on having those Invariant Sections.\ The FSF has lived with contant criticism for many years. Say what you wish; we will make no concession to threats like this. I'm not trying to be a 'threat' to you; I'm just suggesting a possible future, and am asking you whether you have considered it. If you have, good; if you haven't, please do. I for one will know what the FSF stands for, and will not easily be pursuaded to think of the FSF as an '3v1l' organization, but I'm not sure everyone thinks that way. -- Wouter Verhelst Debian GNU/Linux -- http://www.debian.org Nederlandstalige Linux-documentatie -- http://nl.linux.org Stop breathing down my neck. My breathing is merely a simulation. So is my neck, stop it anyway! -- Voyager's EMH versus the Prometheus' EMH, stardate 51462. signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 07:33:48 +0100 Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sorry, but at least I understood software at start of discussion more as a synonym to programms, but I'm not a native english speaker. I am sorry that software has been mistranslated frequently, but this is not unusual. Many languages have false friends, yet we do not spell out all of them just in case. [...] So, it's not true that all people using software as programms are doing it to get better arguments. There are some people that do it, It was not claimed that all people with the synonym definition have that motive.
Re: License requirements for DSP binaries?
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:47:26AM +0200, Thomas Hood wrote: IBM distributes the Linux driver and the binaries in a tarball that it says is licensed under the GPL. http://oss.software.ibm.com/acpmodem/ No source code is provided for the DSP binaries. (N.B., past discussions of this issue have reached the conclusion that such software can nevertheless be distributed in main.) If it's licensed under the GPL, and no source is provided, then it can not be distributed at all, not even in non-free, unless there never was source to begin with. (I assume this isn't the case, as you said no source code is provided, not no source code exists.) A link to past discussions would be useful, to avoid repeating them. -- Glenn Maynard
Re: Unidentified subject!
On 2003-09-22 07:30:41 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And do you really think that every software (of your wide definition) you can have on computer is part of the Operating System? The goal of Debian is to provide an Operating System, isn't it? See http://www.uk.debian.org/intro/about#what Apparently it's clear that Debian do not consider that his very own logo must be free software Has Debian taken a decision on that? At least some developers think that having a non-DFSG-free logo is a bug, for similar reasons as those that mean having non-DFSG-free manuals is a bug. Maybe because the software that must be included in a Free Software Operating System is mostly programs and documentation... No auxiliary data files at all? Also, FSF do not consider documentation software. So, you recognize that in fact you want every literary works to be DFSG-compliant, software or not. This makes it sound as if this is a sudden admission on my part. It is not. I believe I have been fairly consistent on this point, even from before I was aware of the FSF. It totally explains why you need a so broad definition of software. It is not a broad definition of software, but a correct one. I encourage GNU to research the origins of the word. As a matter of fact, you are no longer discussing about an Operating System. This is hardly my fault. The previous article invited it. Maybe FDL fans should keep more tightly to the problem under discussion, but tangents are always occurring. If you feel we stray too far to be relevant, take it off-list, as I frequently do. -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know. http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ gopher://g.towers.org.uk/ [EMAIL PROTECTED] Creative copyleft computing services via http://www.ttllp.co.uk/
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 06:58:19 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. If logiciel truly does not mean the same as the English word software, then it should probably be reported as a bug against Debian's French translation when used in its place. (I think that programaro (group around programs AIUI, translated by some as collection of programs) or softvaro (imported word) should be used instead of programo (lit. program) for its EO translation.)
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 04:00:32 +0100 Branden Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IRS = Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. bureaucracy in charge of I am aware what IRS is in the US, but Mathieu is French and I think their taxes are collected by some part of MINEFI. I cannot find what French IRS is, so maybe he did just goof and think he was on a USian list. Very confusing, as ever. TSO, NCVO, HMCE, IR/CA...
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* MJ Ray ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 10:03]: On 2003-09-22 07:33:48 +0100 Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sorry, but at least I understood software at start of discussion more as a synonym to programms, but I'm not a native english speaker. I am sorry that software has been mistranslated frequently, but this is not unusual. Many languages have false friends, yet we do not spell out all of them just in case. Yes. However, as software is a so fundamental term to Debian, it would perhaps be better to make an appropriate (semi-)official statement anywhere. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 09:27:52 +0100 Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes. However, as software is a so fundamental term to Debian, it would perhaps be better to make an appropriate (semi-)official statement anywhere. It seems a little odd to expect Debian to contain an official statement saying by software, we mean software. Let the people who use bizarre definitions say by software, we don't mean software but this other thing. Fun note: on http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/fs-translations.html FSF give libera softvaro as a translation of free software. That has the opposite problem to debian's apparent French mistranslation. I think that libera programo (lit. free program) may be closer to FSF's preferred meaning. I think I have seen Free Software Foundation translated as organizo por libera programaro in the past, but I can't find that on their site. Random Thought: FSF claim to support freedom of the press. Why not the free press movement?
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 07:33:48 +0100 Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sorry, but at least I understood software at start of discussion more as a synonym to programms, but I'm not a native english speaker. I am sorry that software has been mistranslated frequently, but this is not unusual. Many languages have false friends, yet we do not spell out all of them just in case. And there are more complex issues than false friends... Some words are polysemic but have monosemic translations. For instance, gratuit is a correct translation of free. But libre is also a correct translation of free. And gratuit does not mean at all libre. Logiciel is a correct translation of software in most of the case. And there's no word to translate software in its widest sense -- probably because nobody in France ever needed that word. Note that the issue with software have nothing to do with false friends. Logiciel and software have nothing in common. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: Unidentified subject!
Steve Dobson [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Mathieu On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:30:41AM +0200, Mathieu Roy wrote: MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : And do you really think that every software (of your wide definition) you can have on computer is part of the Operating System? The goal of Debian is to provide an Operating System, isn't it? The Social Contract is about producing the Debian system and other works that provide a useful platform for our users. The Operating System is just part of that work. I see it as the result of that work. So, you recognize that in fact you want every literary works to be DFSG-compliant, software or not. It totally explains why you need a so broad definition of software. Yes, wouldn't it be much nicer to live in a world where everything is free. I agree. But I feel free enough when I can redistribute as I will a political essay from someone else. If I feel a need to edit that essay, I just start writing my own essay, by quoting eventually the original one. And if I must quote almost all the original one, it means that I have no so many things to add and I would just make a commentary about it. I do not see any urgent freedom to protect here, apart the freedom to redistribute a document. Someone can grant anybody to modify his political essays, but I do not think that not giving this right is similar than forbidding anybody to access the code of a program, to modify it and redistribute it. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : * Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 08:02]: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Because we require them to be free if we include them in Debian? Hum, you do not follow a rule _just_ to follow the rules, do you? There was a reason to promote free software, and I'm not sure that the whole issue was about political essays, but about programs and their documentation. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
As far as the logo, the name Mathieu Roy isn't free in the DFSG-sense. Neither is the Debian name. I don't see why the Debian logo should be either. I don't believe the logo needs to be free; I think the way it is being handled is appropriate. However, others were arguing recently that everything in Debian is software and that the DFSG applies to it.
GFDL
Someone else criticized the idea (though no one had proposed it) of giving the FSF special consideration; now you seem to be saying just the opposite, that you believe in giving the FSF less cooperation that you would give to anyone else. The consequences of such an approach should be obvious: there will be no cooperation. He didn't say cooperation. He said consideration. I stand corrected, but this doesn't change the point. We are disappointed that you don't value freedom in documentation as much as you do for programs. I value freedom in documentation just as much as I do for programs. I value it so much that I designed the GFDL specifically to induce commercial publishers to publish free documentation. However, I don't follow the DFSG, nor an interpretation of the DFSG that labels documentation as software; so I don't have an artificial reason to insist on identical criteria for freedom for manuals and for programs. This reminded me of another relevant difference between manuals and software. It is harder to find good technical writers as volunteers than good programmers as volunteers. So I decided it was worth while going quite close to the line, in the GFDL, to try to induce commercial publishers to use it. I would not think of going so close to the line in a software license, since I know there's no need.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 06:58:19 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. If logiciel truly does not mean the same as the English word software, then it should probably be reported as a bug against Debian's French translation when used in its place. (I think that programaro (group around programs AIUI, translated by some as collection of programs) or softvaro (imported word) should be used instead of programo (lit. program) for its EO translation.) Logiciel truly means program (it can surely include the technical documentation). But it is a very acceptable translation for software in the narrow sense (which seems to be the most common sense, however). Free Software is known in France as Logiciel Libre. I'm not sure that you will find many supporters of Logiciel Libre that really thinks that Free Software is not about specifically software programs. Anyway, if you are no longer talking about programs, you are no longer talking about Operating System and even no longer talking about computing. Because if you propose rules to handle documents sitting on a computer which are not programs or their documentation, there's no reason not to apply these rules to the same documents in a non-software form. So maybe you are right (I do not share your point of view) but anyway this is off-topic for Debian and for Logiciel Libre. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: Unidentified subject!
On 2003-09-22 10:38:18 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [...] I feel free enough when I can redistribute as I will a political essay from someone else. If I feel a need to edit that essay, I just start writing my own essay Some people feel the same about software in general. It is barely relevant, unless you want to make the case that Debian should not have any standard of freedom because it will never satisfy everyone.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 10:41:16 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : * Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 08:02]: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Because we require them to be free if we include them in Debian? Hum, you do not follow a rule _just_ to follow the rules, do you? Mathieu claims to see no need for derived works of political essays despite all of the suggested reasons which are broadly similar to those for free software in general. I think Andreas cannot be blamed for using desire to include them in Debian without compromising our commitments as a reason to make the case for DFSG-free-ness.
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 04:00:32 +0100 Branden Robinson [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: IRS = Internal Revenue Service, the U.S. bureaucracy in charge of I am aware what IRS is in the US, but Mathieu is French and And this fact do not allows you to make assumptions. I think their taxes are collected by some part of MINEFI. I cannot find what French IRS is, so maybe he did just goof and think he was on a USian list. Very confusing Sure, it is more confusing when talking in English to mention a well known kind of institution in one major english-speaking country than talking about French specific institutions that, I'm sure, everybody is familiar with... It is very sensible. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 10:47:11 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Free Software is known in France as Logiciel Libre. I'm not sure that you will find many supporters of Logiciel Libre that really thinks that Free Software is not about specifically software programs. This is expected, because FSF encourages a misuse of the word software and that is possibly how most LL supporters will know the word. From what you say, logiciel appears fine for their purpose. Anyway, if you are no longer talking about programs, you are no longer talking about Operating System and even no longer talking about computing. Huh? Software is trivially always about computing. OSes arguably include their documentation and bundled works of art, music etc. Because if you propose rules to handle documents sitting on a computer which are not programs or their documentation, there's no reason not to apply these rules to the same documents in a non-software form. That is my view, but again we are drifting outside the scope of Debian, so I will not pursue this.
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 10:52:22 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sure, it is more confusing when talking in English to mention a well known kind of institution in one major english-speaking country than talking about French specific institutions that, I'm sure, everybody is familiar with... It is very sensible. This is simply incredible. A frenchman encouraging US cultural dominance! Clearly, it is less confusing to refer to a generic term, such as tax authority, than a particular country's fairly obscure name for it. I only know it from the USian literature I have read. If a frenchman who frequently points out that he is not a 1L speaker of English refers to an acronym, I assume that it is some global or a local French thing. If I were to speak of HMCE, at least people would have a chance of finding it in a search based on my domain.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 10:47:11 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Free Software is known in France as Logiciel Libre. I'm not sure that you will find many supporters of Logiciel Libre that really thinks that Free Software is not about specifically software programs. This is expected, because FSF encourages a misuse of the word software The FSF always has been about computing, way before Debian even exists. and that is possibly how most LL supporters will know the word. From what you say, logiciel appears fine for their purpose. It is already very hard to promote the Logiciel Libre in France. I think that emcumbering it with your view described at the end of this message would not be helpful at all. Because as you see, it is possible to support Logiciel Libre and, however, do not agree with your view described at the end - the link between the two point of view is not obvious. Anyway, if you are no longer talking about programs, you are no longer talking about Operating System and even no longer talking about computing. Huh? Software is trivially always about computing. Your argument against the GFDL invariant section applies to texts in a non-software form. So basically, your point of view is not specifically computing related. Because if you propose rules to handle documents sitting on a computer which are not programs or their documentation, there's no reason not to apply these rules to the same documents in a non-software form. That is my view, but again we are drifting outside the scope of Debian, so I will not pursue this. This view clearly have an influence on your usage of the word software in the Debian case. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise
On Sat, Sep 20, 2003 at 05:27:46PM -0400, Richard Stallman wrote: Remember the hypothetical emacs reference card, which must be accompanied by 12 pages of additional invariant material? Sounds like a big deal to me. If the GPL were used, it would have to be accompanied by 6 pages of additional invariant material. That is still bigger than the reference card. Do you object to the GPL on these grounds? The reference card would have to be accompanied by the GPL, yes, but it would not require the text of the GPL being printed on it. With the GFDL, this requirement is there. -- Wouter Verhelst Debian GNU/Linux -- http://www.debian.org Nederlandstalige Linux-documentatie -- http://nl.linux.org Stop breathing down my neck. My breathing is merely a simulation. So is my neck, stop it anyway! -- Voyager's EMH versus the Prometheus' EMH, stardate 51462.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 10:41:16 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : * Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 08:02]: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Because we require them to be free if we include them in Debian? Hum, you do not follow a rule _just_ to follow the rules, do you? Mathieu claims to see no need for derived works of political essays despite all of the suggested reasons which are broadly similar to those for free software I do not agree with your point of view, that's all. in general. I think Andreas cannot be blamed for using desire to include them in Debian without compromising our commitments as a reason to make the case for DFSG-free-ness. It does not compromise any desire to keep the Operating System Free. But, sure, it compromise your desire to make any literature text free as Free Software, whether it stands on a computer or not. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 11:21:35 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The FSF always has been about computing, way before Debian even exists. The FSF apparently claims that it is only concerned with program freedom. and that is possibly how most LL supporters will know the word. From what you say, logiciel appears fine for their purpose. It is already very hard to promote the Logiciel Libre in France. I think that emcumbering it with your view described at the end of this message would not be helpful at all. That view is not a requirement for support of free software. Your argument against the GFDL invariant section applies to texts in a non-software form. So basically, your point of view is not specifically computing related. This does not invalidate the reasoning for the software form. I believe that it can be generalised, but it is not necessary to believe that. [I advocate free works in all media] This view clearly have an influence on your usage of the word software in the Debian case. Like hell. My school computing lessons have a larger influence. -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know. http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ gopher://g.towers.org.uk/ [EMAIL PROTECTED] Creative copyleft computing services via http://www.ttllp.co.uk/
Re: GFDL
On 2003-09-22 10:05:15 +0100 Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I value freedom in documentation just as much as I do for programs. I value it so much that I designed the GFDL specifically to induce commercial publishers to publish free documentation. Commercial or normally-proprietary or for-dividend? [...] It is harder to find good technical writers as volunteers than good programmers as volunteers. I am not sure that it is, but the FSF seem to be suspicious of the free press movement. A recent example of this was sending a doubting email to the [EMAIL PROTECTED] list instead of engaging with the Geneva03 Autonomous Media Collective to seek the desired answers and see if there can be mutual benefit.
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 10:52:22 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Sure, it is more confusing when talking in English to mention a well known kind of institution in one major english-speaking country than talking about French specific institutions that, I'm sure, everybody is familiar with... It is very sensible. This is simply incredible. A frenchman encouraging US cultural dominance! Clearly, it is less confusing to refer to a generic term, such as tax authority, than a particular country's fairly obscure name for it. I only know it from the USian literature I have read. If a frenchman who frequently points out that he is not a 1L speaker of English refers to an acronym, I assume that it is some global or a local French thing. If I were to speak of HMCE, at least people would have a chance of finding it in a search based on my domain. Maybe speaking English on that list encourage a cultural dominance. However, in our word, in this century, speaking French would not allow me to talk with so many people from different countries, specifically on that list. So I speak English, and I do try to use examples that anybody can understand. If you already made a donation to the FSF or to the SPI, you should know what IRS is. I think that this case is probably pretty common, on this list. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: GNU is perfect and French IRS, was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On 2003-09-22 11:16:04 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Maybe speaking English on that list encourage a cultural dominance. Not really IMO. It's just inconsiderate behaviour. [...] If you already made a donation to the FSF or to the SPI, you should know what IRS is. Why? In the FSF case, there are local associates and even FSFE inside the EU. In the SPI case, there are local payment agents. The US tax authority has no bearing on my local taxes, as far as I know. -- MJR/slef My Opinion Only and possibly not of any group I know. http://mjr.towers.org.uk/ gopher://g.towers.org.uk/ [EMAIL PROTECTED] Creative copyleft computing services via http://www.ttllp.co.uk/
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 11:21:35 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The FSF always has been about computing, way before Debian even exists. The FSF apparently claims that it is only concerned with program freedom. And documentation. Basically the other things sitting a computer are not part of the OS. My girlfriend photography sitting on my computer is not free software. That's not something I think important to be shared. and that is possibly how most LL supporters will know the word. From what you say, logiciel appears fine for their purpose. It is already very hard to promote the Logiciel Libre in France. I think that emcumbering it with your view described at the end of this message would not be helpful at all. That view is not a requirement for support of free software. I agree. Your argument against the GFDL invariant section applies to texts in a non-software form. So basically, your point of view is not specifically computing related. This does not invalidate the reasoning for the software form. I believe that it can be generalised, but it is not necessary to believe that. I think it's necessary to believe that. Why typing a text on a computer should change the freedom given? A free software code printed on a paper should be free software, even if it's not software... [I advocate free works in all media] This view clearly have an influence on your usage of the word software in the Debian case. Like hell. My school computing lessons have a larger influence. In this debate, I mean. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A WDL.
On Sat, Sep 20, 2003 at 05:41:09PM +0100, Andrew Suffield wrote: On Sat, Sep 20, 2003 at 04:42:51PM +0200, Wouter Verhelst wrote: I don't think the GFDL is a good place to start from when writing a documentation license, really. The WDL is a tangled mess. Start with the GPL instead, and try to answer this question: What do I want that this license does not already give me? There's nothing which is not in the GPL that I don't want. Wat I /do/ want, however, is a Free Emacs manual in Debian. Amongst others. I've been convinced that this won't happen with the GFDL, and I'm also quite convinced the FSF will not likely drop the GFDL unless an acceptable (to them) alternative is provided. Therefore, I took to crafting an alternative. Whether the alternative will be accepted by the FSF remains to be seen; but there's no harm in trying (other than that I risk wasting a lot of time in a project with no practical results). Well, the stated goal of the FSF is, as far as I can tell, inherently non-free. So I don't think this is actually possible. I don't have a lot of hope either, but that doesn't mean I shouldn't try. If you could get them to compromise on their goal to some extent, then it should be fairly easy to write a suitable license based on that. Again, that is an alternative (and viable) way to do it, but I find it easier to work in this way. -- Wouter Verhelst Debian GNU/Linux -- http://www.debian.org Nederlandstalige Linux-documentatie -- http://nl.linux.org Stop breathing down my neck. My breathing is merely a simulation. So is my neck, stop it anyway! -- Voyager's EMH versus the Prometheus' EMH, stardate 51462.
Re: Unidentified subject!
MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 10:38:18 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: [...] I feel free enough when I can redistribute as I will a political essay from someone else. If I feel a need to edit that essay, I just start writing my own essay Some people feel the same about software in general. About programs do you mean? Well, when I read a text, I have all the means necessary to understand how the idea works. Not with a program unless I get the source. And rewriting an implementation is not at all likely rephrasing two words. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday 22 September 2003 12:36, Mathieu Roy wrote: My girlfriend photography sitting on my computer is not free software. Who cares about the licence of your girlfriend photographs ? Are you willing to put them in main ? The point is that the photographs on your computer are _software_. Whether they are free or not has absolutely no link with the current thread. Mike
Re: Unidentified subject!
Le lun 22/09/2003 à 08:30, Mathieu Roy a écrit : Apparently it's clear that Debian do not consider that his very own logo must be free software -- that's right, you do not need a logo at all to have a complete free operating system. If Debian already recognize that non-program software can be non-free without that being a problem, why refusing to include a documentation that include a non-program software (technical documentation is likely program)? Can you read ? *WE DO NOT SHIP THE OFFICIAL DEBIAN LOGO WITHIN THE DEBIAN OPERATING SYSTEM.* And if you have problems with English: *LE LOGO OFFICIEL DEBIAN NE FAIT PAS PARTIE DU SYSTÈME D'EXPLOITATION DEBIAN.* The open use logo has another issue as its license needs a better wording, but almost everyone on this list will agree that it needs to be clarified. And you should note that while SPI is ready to change its licensing to keep the open use logo in main (AND NOT THE OFFICIAL DEBIAN LOGO WHICH HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE DEBIAN OPERATING SYSTEM), the FSF doesn't seem to be willing to do such things. Nobody here is asking the FSF to make the political statements on their website DFSG-free. We are explaining that all parts of the Debian operating system, including documentations (BUT NOT THE OFFICIAL DEBIAN LOGO WHICH IS NOT PART OF THE DEBIAN OPERATING SYSTEM), must be DFSG-free. -- .''`. Josselin Mouette/\./\ : :' : [EMAIL PROTECTED] `. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED] `- Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom signature.asc Description: Ceci est une partie de message numériquement signée
Re: License requirements for DSP binaries?
Le lun 22/09/2003 à 09:46, Glenn Maynard a écrit : On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 08:47:26AM +0200, Thomas Hood wrote: IBM distributes the Linux driver and the binaries in a tarball that it says is licensed under the GPL. http://oss.software.ibm.com/acpmodem/ No source code is provided for the DSP binaries. (N.B., past discussions of this issue have reached the conclusion that such software can nevertheless be distributed in main.) If it's licensed under the GPL, and no source is provided, then it can not be distributed at all, not even in non-free, unless there never was source to begin with. (I assume this isn't the case, as you said no source code is provided, not no source code exists.) If the binaries were entirely written using assembly code, the binary here equates the source. But if they were written using a higher-level language, it makes them more hardly suitable for main. However, if modifying them is achievable and potentially useful, they could be considered the same as bitmap pictures when the layered source is missing. -- .''`. Josselin Mouette/\./\ : :' : [EMAIL PROTECTED] `. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED] `- Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom signature.asc Description: Ceci est une partie de message numériquement signée
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Monday 22 September 2003 12:36, Mathieu Roy wrote: My girlfriend photography sitting on my computer is not free software. Who cares about the licence of your girlfriend photographs ? Are you willing to put them in main ? The point is that the photographs on your computer are _software_. Whether they are free or not has absolutely no link with the current thread. The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mathieu Roy wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. Mathieu, I would suggest that you to carefully read Le petit Robert's definition for logiciel. (For those of you that are not French speaking, Le petit Robert is one of the most respected French language dictionaries.) In the 1983 edition (on my desk) I read: LOGICIEL: n.m. Ensemble de travaux de logique, d'analyse, de programmation, nécessaires au fonctionnement d'un ensemble de traitement de l'information Emphasis (opposé à matériel) /emphasis. (Emphasis mine). A translation of the emphasized text is: (opposite to hardware). So, Debian's use of the word logiciel in french seems quite in line with the English semantics used by people on debian-legal. Etienne -- Etienne M. Gagnon, Ph.D. http://www.info.uqam.ca/~egagnon/ SableVM: http://www.sablevm.org/ SableCC: http://www.sablecc.org/
Re: GPL preamble removal
Nathanael Nerode [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Brian T. Sniffen wrote: OK. I have a copy of Emacs here, licensed to me under the GNU GPL2. I have made some modifications to it, and updated the changelogs and history notes. I wish to give it to a friend. Section 2b requires that I distribute my new program, Sniffmacs, under the terms of this License, GPL2. Can I give my friend Sniffmacs, together with the Terms and Conditions section of the GPL, retitled as Sniffen GPL? As far as I can tell, this meets the requirements for creating a new license based on the GPL, and meets the requirements for distributing GPL'd software. Keith Dunwoody wrote: I believe the answer is no. The appropriate part of the GPL is section 2b. Keith is wrong; the appropriate part is actually section 1. ...and give any other recipients of the Program a copy of this License along with the Program. In this context, this License means the unmodified text of the GNU GPL, presumably including the preamble; there really isn't any other interpretation. So you can distrbitute Sniffmacs under the Sniffen GPL, but you have to distribute a copy of the original GNU GPL with it, kind of defeating the purpose... Thanks for the response -- I hadn't noticed that phrasing before. But if I give *you* a copy of Sniffmacs under the Sniffen GPL, wouldn't you then be bound only to give others the SGPL, not the GGPL with its Preamble? -Brian
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday 22 September 2003 14:32, Mathieu Roy wrote: The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. The point is whether every software IN DEBIAN needs to be free. Mike
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 11:40]: Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : * Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 08:02]: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Because we require them to be free if we include them in Debian? Hum, you do not follow a rule _just_ to follow the rules, do you? You seem to live in the wrong country. ;) There was a reason to promote free software, and I'm not sure that the whole issue was about political essays, but about programs and their documentation. The issue is to give recipients the full freedom. And I don't see which part of this issue doesn't apply to essays, regarding Debians position. (I do, however, publish parts of my essays under a non-free license. But I don't ask Debian then to include them in main, and they've a very destinct audience where it is more usefull to work with other licenses - that also gives the freedom to any recipient to use my ideas, and words, but not in a way that Debian would consider as free.) Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. As someone asked in another thread: Did you really pass PP ?
How to avoid missunderstandings (was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal)
* MJ Ray ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 11:26]: On 2003-09-22 09:27:52 +0100 Andreas Barth [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Yes. However, as software is a so fundamental term to Debian, it would perhaps be better to make an appropriate (semi-)official statement anywhere. It seems a little odd to expect Debian to contain an official statement saying by software, we mean software. Let the people who use bizarre definitions say by software, we don't mean software but this other thing. Well, for a native speaker you're of course right. But for someone speaking english as a foreign language, it would help to avoid missunderstandings. So, such a statement would have a good place in the The top 10 of misunderstandings in debian-legal-FAQ. Or like a statement: When we say software, we mean software. If you're a native english speaker, that shouldn't be a problem to you. But the word software gives false friends in some other languages, where it is used as synonym for the english program. (Or some other statement.) Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Monday 22 September 2003 12:36, Mathieu Roy wrote: My girlfriend photography sitting on my computer is not free software. Who cares about the licence of your girlfriend photographs ? Are you willing to put them in main ? The point is that the photographs on your computer are _software_. Whether they are free or not has absolutely no link with the current thread. The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. Actually, the whole debate is really about programs and their documentation and the need for them to be free. Invariant sections make the documentation non-free. You're the one trying to sidetrack that issue to other content. Above you said software needs to be free and program and their documentation. Start with that. The documentation isn't free if it has Invariant Sections.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Etienne Gagnon [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Mathieu Roy wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. Mathieu, I would suggest that you to carefully read Le petit Robert's definition for logiciel. (For those of you that are not French speaking, Le petit Robert is one of the most respected French language dictionaries.) In the 1983 edition (on my desk) I read: LOGICIEL: n.m. Ensemble de travaux de logique, d'analyse, de programmation, nécessaires au fonctionnement d'un ensemble de traitement de l'information Emphasis (opposé à matériel) /emphasis. (Emphasis mine). A translation of the emphasized text is: (opposite to hardware). Apparently you forgot to read/understand the rest of the phrase. So, Debian's use of the word logiciel in french seems quite in line with the English semantics used by people on debian-legal. Please, try to pretend to any educated French person that his Bible on his computer is a Logiciel :)) -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Starting to talk
Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Monday 22 September 2003 14:32, Mathieu Roy wrote: The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. The point is whether every software IN DEBIAN needs to be free. You are right, that's the question. Free, in think that everybody agree, but under which definition of freedom? Does the DFSG definition of freedom that applies to program (nobody question that) help us to draw the line at the correct place also for documentation? In other terms, do we consider the fact that we cannot modify a political essay in a documentation so harmful that we would prefer stopping delivering this documentation? That is indeed the question. I think personally that it is harmful to do so and harmless to let that essays where they are, since they do not interfere with the program and documentation usability. What do you think? Saying it's not DFSG-compliant is not an answer. Apart from MJ Ray, which think that any document should follow the Free Software rules, software or not, nobody against the GFDLed text inclusion clearly stated his point of view. People are complaining about this discussion being endless. But they just have to say what they are thinking good or bad for Debian in this case, not just what is their interpretation of a text. Right, in this case -project is maybe a more appropriate place, but it is here where the discussion started. Regards, -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Peter S Galbraith [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. As someone asked in another thread: Did you really pass PP ? What does this question mean? Does Debian impose on applicant to believe that a political essay should be ruled by the DFSG? I do not think so. If it is an implicit law, please make it explicit. However, I know what is the DFSG and I know what I should do when contributing for Debian and what I should not do. I am a very lawful person. Now, I think that the question is not really what the DFSG allows. Because it's pretty clear that the DSFG does not allow GFDLed documentation with Invariant section. The question is: do we think that tolerating this non-DFSG essays in some GFDLed documentation is more harmful to Debian than removing these GNU manuals? That's the question. -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: Starting to talk
Why do I have the impression to be in an infinite loop ?
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 09:30:17AM +0100, MJ Ray wrote: On 2003-09-22 06:58:19 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. If logiciel truly does not mean the same as the English word software, then it should probably be reported as a bug against Debian's French translation when used in its place. (I think that programaro (group around programs AIUI, translated by some as collection of programs) or softvaro (imported word) should be used instead of programo (lit. program) for its EO translation.) The French cognate would seem to be programmaire; the equivalent term does exist with the correct meaning in Spanish and Catalan, but I don't believe it's used in French. -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer pgp3t5XENB50P.pgp Description: PGP signature
GFDL
RMS writes: However, I don't follow the DFSG, nor an interpretation of the DFSG that labels documentation as software; so I don't have an artificial reason to insist on identical criteria for freedom for manuals and for programs. This is not merely an artifical reason. If someone added a revolutionary memory allocater to FreeBSD, every free OS could copy it in an instant, at the cost of another copyright notice, with no user-visible costs. But if he writes a revolutionary intro to regexes and releases it under the GFDL with invariant sections Why the GPL Sucks and Why Linux and Hurd users should use a Real OS, in no non-theoretical world could Linux or Hurd use it. If you can't use the manual for what you want, even if it's merely because it offends you and you can't fix it, it's simply not a free license. It is harder to find good technical writers as volunteers than good programmers as volunteers. So I decided it was worth while going quite close to the line, in the GFDL, to try to induce commercial publishers to use it. The vast majority of the manuals under the GFDL with invariant sections (the main point of Debian's concern) come from the FSF, not commercial publishers. The GFDL, as currently used and by whom, serves you. If the FSF were willing to back away from that edge, Debian would be much happier, whether or not commercial publishers used the GFDL. -- __ Sign-up for your own personalized E-mail at Mail.com http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup CareerBuilder.com has over 400,000 jobs. Be smarter about your job search http://corp.mail.com/careers
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 10:26:38AM +0100, MJ Ray wrote: It seems a little odd to expect Debian to contain an official statement saying by software, we mean software. Let the people who use bizarre definitions say by software, we don't mean software but this other thing. While I don't normally support blatant word definitions, I do see how adding a blatant statement about software meaning non-Hardware could help to ease a good deal of the confusion that repeatedly surrounds it in these discussions. Like it or not the word does have two meanings in common usage. -- Jamin W. Collins Remember, root always has a loaded gun. Don't run around with it unless you absolutely need it. -- Vineet Kumar
Re: Starting to talk
Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Why do I have the impression to be in an infinite loop ? Because you are confronted with a situation where your arguments, that you repeat and repeat, do not convince your interlocutor (me in this case)? You know, there is an easy way out, if you're fed up. Apart from that, you did not answered to my question. Why? Do I need to repeat my question? -- Mathieu Roy Homepage: http://yeupou.coleumes.org Not a native english speaker: http://stock.coleumes.org/doc.php?i=/misc-files/flawed-english
Re: Starting to talk
On Monday 22 September 2003 17:05, Mathieu Roy wrote: Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Why do I have the impression to be in an infinite loop ? Because you are confronted with a situation where your arguments, that you repeat and repeat, do not convince your interlocutor (me in this case)? Ah okay, now I understand ; you are trying to make the same discussion over and over again, with every single debian-legal poster... You know, there is an easy way out, if you're fed up. The question is : am I the only one to be fed up by you ? Apart from that, you did not answered to my question. Why? Do I need to repeat my question? Parce que tu casses les couilles. Mike
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday 22 September 2003 16:39, Mathieu Roy wrote: Now, I think that the question is not really what the DFSG allows. Because it's pretty clear that the DSFG does not allow GFDLed documentation with Invariant section. The question is: do we think that tolerating this non-DFSG essays in some GFDLed documentation is more harmful to Debian than removing these GNU manuals? That's the question. No, that's NOT the question. As you just told, DFSG does not allow GFDLed documentation with Invariant Section, thus they can not be distributed in main. Whether it is harmful or not is NOT the point. The point is that they are non-free, thus they can not be distributed in main. Mike
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Sunday, Sep 21, 2003, at 18:33 US/Eastern, Richard Stallman wrote: Several parts of the DFSG contain the word program. For instance, Yes, many parts of it do. Its unfortunate that it isn't written clearer. LIPstrongSource Code/strong PThe program must include source code, and must allow distribution in source code as well as compiled form./P We can understand this in terms of documentation, too. The document must include source code (for example, ΤεΧ, not just generated PDF), and we must be able to distribute in both ΤεΧ and PDF. Each of these assumes that the software in question is a program. To make that even clearer, one of them also assumes that the availability of source code for it is an important issue. Source code generally is an important thing for documents. Witness transparent forms in the GFDL. If you interpret item 1 of the social contract as meaning that everything in Debian is considered software, then you run smack into the fact that the DFSG equates software with programs. So you have to ignore what those words say, too. Yeah, but if we take it any other way, we're left without guidelines for what can go into Debian. Thomas Bushnell proposed another interpretation, in which certain things that are included in the Debian package files are not part of Debian for this purpose. That way, you don't have to apply the DFSG to them. I don't recall anyone suggesting that, though it is possible I just haven't read that message yet. But that seems like a lawyer's trick, not a good way to run a free software distribution.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 01:58 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. If the French Logiciel is not the same as the English software, then please file a bug.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 12:36:14PM +0200, Mathieu Roy wrote: MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On 2003-09-22 11:21:35 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The FSF always has been about computing, way before Debian even exists. The FSF apparently claims that it is only concerned with program freedom. And documentation. Basically the other things sitting a computer are not part of the OS. My girlfriend photography sitting on my computer is not free software. That's not something I think important to be shared. The procmail rules I have in my home directory are not part of the OS and are not free software. I don't feel it's important to share them. That doesn't mean they aren't software -- it just means they aren't *free* software. Last I checked, the FSF also defended the user's right to create software locally without enforced sharing. -- Steve Langasek postmodern programmer pgpcrc38Qvjbk.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 02:02 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: I do not see either why RMS's political essays should be free in the DFSG-sense either, even when included in a documentation. Care to give reasons they shouldn't be? I gave reasons why I don't thing the Official Debian Logo should be fully free; it functions as Debian's endorsement. Certainly, I don't expect to be able to ship a modified version of RMS's essays as RMS's essays.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 05:04 US/Eastern, Richard Stallman wrote: I don't believe the logo needs to be free; I think the way it is being handled is appropriate. However, others were arguing recently that everything in Debian is software and that the DFSG applies to it. Ah. This isn't a contradiction: The official logo is not supposed to be in packages. It's not supposed to be in Debian.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 02:13 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: But is the upstream author of these *Bugs*. Does it means that Debian have an implicit policy which is making non-free software is ok unless you distribute it? I'm not sure what your asking, but I think it'd be safe to say Debian strongly believes in the right to private modifications. And do you consider the official logo as a private modification? ... now I'm *really* not sure what you're asking!
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
On Monday, Sep 22, 2003, at 05:34 US/Eastern, Mathieu Roy wrote: Logiciel is a correct translation of software in most of the case. And there's no word to translate software in its widest sense -- probably because nobody in France ever needed that word. Surely information theory people in France must have such a word?
Re: What does GFDL do?
Don Armstrong [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Sun, 21 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: There's a critical difference here. The GPL can accompany the reference card. The invariant material must be in the reference card. I explained months ago, and again last week, why this is not so. I must have missed that explanation. Can you provide a reference to it? From a relatively strict reading of the license, however, I see no indication of a method which you could distribute the reference card with the license and invariant sections not merely accompanying, but affixed. Perhaps you or someone else could walk through and explain the verbiage of the license that allows one to do this? The explanation used in the past was that the license could be in a separate volume of the document: so I could distribute a hardy plastic-coated titanium reference card, and accompany it with a small-print onionskin on which is printed the GFDL and any invariant sections. If I distribute in quantity, of course, I have to include a CD with a transparent format of my work, despite the fact that---since I used Framemaker to design the card---this is not the source and is an awkward position from which to begin producing such a card. [The closest I came was removing a single document from a collection of documents, but then you have to follow the rules applying to verbatim copying, which doesn't seem to grant us anything usefull.] Don Armstrong -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Re: What does GFDL do?
Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: If the GPL were used, it would have to be accompanied by 6 pages of additional invariant material. That is still bigger than the reference card. Do you object to the GPL on these grounds? There's a critical difference here. The GPL can accompany the reference card. The invariant material must be in the reference card. I explained months ago, and again last week, why this is not so. Hunh. Perhaps, if the DRM and Transparent Format issues are resolved, the Emacs Manual can go in Contrib with a dependency on the invariant sections in a separate volume of the document in non-free. Would that satisfy your interpretation of the GFDL? A similar issue has come up recently on -devel[2] regarding single files downloaded out of a tarball or a cvs repository. Hopefully it's clear that making the license available by reference is sufficient to allow people to download single files from a cvs repository. Making the license available by reference does not satisfy the GPL. The GPL must accompany the GPL-covered materials. Access to the program as a collection of files, in such a way that the user might copy just part, is acceptable as long as you do not encourage people to copy less than the whole that includes the GPL. So do you believe that Debian is violating the GPL by not including a copy of the GPL with each GPL-licensed package, but instead having a common-licenses directory containing the GPL on every Debian system? I understand that these are questions with complicated answers, and I appreciate your efforts to answer them. -Brian -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Software and its translations (was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal)
MJ Ray, 2003-09-22 10:30:19 +0200 : On 2003-09-22 06:58:19 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Since Debian use the translation Logiciel for Debian French pages, it means that the word software must be clearly defined by Debian. If logiciel truly does not mean the same as the English word software, then it should probably be reported as a bug against Debian's French translation when used in its place. It does mean the same as software, or at least the same as the Debian definition of software: - it can be opposed to matériel (hardware -- compare matière, matter); - it can be used as an adjective, for instance sous forme logicielle, meaning in a software form, thus matching the every collection of bits on a computer definition; - un logiciel can even be used to mean a software program, whereas the phrase a software sounds awkward to me in English (but then again, I'm not a native English speaker, and maybe software is a countable noun -- can you say two softwares?). (I think that programaro (group around programs AIUI, translated by some as collection of programs) or softvaro (imported word) should be used instead of programo (lit. program) for its EO translation.) I have no real clue about EO yet, but that sounds reasonable. Roland. -- Roland Mas When I eat a biscuit, it stays eaten! -- Arthur Dent, in So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (Douglas Adams)
Re: PennMUSH license concerns.
Ervin Hearn III [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Concern has been expressed on the debian-devel list about license status of PennMUSH and its legitimacy. PennMUSH was relicensed under the Artistic License as of version 1.7.6p0 in November 2002. Aspects of PennMUSH's code have been drawn from, of course, it's TinyMUD roots as well as its 'sibling' codebase, TinyMUSH (2.0, 2.2, 3.0). I spoke with the PennMUSH source maintainer and one of the developers/upstream authors, Alan Schwartz (aka Javelin), about any information regarding how the relicensing was handled and the concerns expressed about it. This is what he said in response: TinyMUSH 2.0, whose authors relicensed all their code in 1995 to a BSD license, so that's clean. We also contacted the TM 2.0 authors (Joseph Traub and Glenn Crocker) and got their agreement anyway. The next bit is TinyMUSH 2.2, which their devteam (Jean Marie Diaz, Lydia Leong, Devin Hooker) all agreed to relicense under Artistic (from 2.2.5, I believe), and I have their email saying so. Then there's the PennMUSH copyright holder (me, Talek, Raevnos), and we all agreed. So Penn's clean. TM 3.0's dev team also switched to Artistic (as did tinymux, I believe) at the same time. I don't know anything about 2.2.4unoff, which we've never incorporated code from to my knowledge. He has also stated that he did track down all authors which followed TinyMUD, which was cleanly licensed under the BSD license, to get their approval, and has emails from them granting permission. I would appreciate any comments regarding whether concerns about PennMUSH's legitimacy under the Artistic License are valid, and legal obstacles for its inclusion as a Debian package. Nice work. It sounds like there are only two minor issues: * First, you *do* mean the Clarified Artistic License, right? The original is a bit of a mess in some parts. * Second, the copyright file should preferably include that whole history, including statements from all the copyright holders relicensing their work. Especially note the difference between You may distribute my work under the CAL and I licence my work to you under the CAL. If the e-mail exchange must be kept confidential, a statement from Mr. Schwartz to this effect and listing the various copyright holders who have given permission will do. -Brian -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Re: Unidentified subject!
Mathieu Roy wrote: Well, when I read a text, I have all the means necessary to understand how the idea works. Not with a program unless I get the source. We consider even trivial software such as Hello world to be worthy of Freeness, even though in this case you have everything necessary to understand how the idea works without the source. But fundamentally, you do not appear to believe that the ability to make derived works from philosophical texts (or various other things) is a necessity - Debian seems to. The sheer number of postings you have made should have made it clear that you are not going to change our opinions, and we are not going to change yours. Further discussion of this seems fairly pointless. Can we just agree to differ? -- Matthew Garrett | [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: What does GFDL do?
On Mon, 2003-09-22 at 10:46, Brian T. Sniffen wrote: Richard Stallman [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: If the GPL were used, it would have to be accompanied by 6 pages of additional invariant material. That is still bigger than the reference card. Do you object to the GPL on these grounds? There's a critical difference here. The GPL can accompany the reference card. The invariant material must be in the reference card. I explained months ago, and again last week, why this is not so. Hunh. Perhaps, if the DRM and Transparent Format issues are resolved, the Emacs Manual can go in Contrib with a dependency on the invariant sections in a separate volume of the document in non-free. Would that satisfy your interpretation of the GFDL? contrib is guaranteed to be free software, and thus meet the DFSG. A distributor should be able to package up main and contrib, and have a good idea of what permissions they have w.r.t. that source code. Your suggestion would mandate distribution of non-free (or parts of it) with any distribution of contrib. contrib is meant for circumventing technical requirements like shared libraries. The GFDL is a legal requirement. -- Joe Wreschnig [EMAIL PROTECTED] signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Starting to talk
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 04:14:45PM +0200, Mathieu Roy wrote: Mike Hommey [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : On Monday 22 September 2003 14:32, Mathieu Roy wrote: The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. The point is whether every software IN DEBIAN needs to be free. You are right, that's the question. Free, in think that everybody agree, but under which definition of freedom? Does the DFSG definition of freedom that applies to program (nobody question that) help us to draw the line at the correct place also for documentation? In other terms, do we consider the fact that we cannot modify a political essay in a documentation so harmful that we would prefer stopping delivering this documentation? Yes. That is indeed the question. I think personally that it is harmful to do so That is without question, but that does not mean we should not do so (because the alternative isn't much better) and harmless to let that essays where they are, Harmless, perhaps. The right thing to do, no. since they do not interfere with the program and documentation usability. What do you think? Saying it's not DFSG-compliant is not an answer. It is. Moreover, it's the only correct answer. Apart from MJ Ray, which think that any document should follow the Free Software rules, software or not, nobody against the GFDLed text inclusion clearly stated his point of view. Please. Read http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200308/msg01031.html and the thread that follows it. Or, if you don't have much time, that message and http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2003/debian-legal-200308/msg01680.html -- Wouter Verhelst Debian GNU/Linux -- http://www.debian.org Nederlandstalige Linux-documentatie -- http://nl.linux.org Stop breathing down my neck. My breathing is merely a simulation. So is my neck, stop it anyway! -- Voyager's EMH versus the Prometheus' EMH, stardate 51462. signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mathieu Roy wrote: LOGICIEL: n.m. Ensemble de travaux de logique, d'analyse, de programmation, nécessaires au fonctionnement d'un ensemble de traitement de l'information Emphasis (opposé à matériel) /emphasis. (Emphasis mine). A translation of the emphasized text is: (opposite to hardware). Apparently you forgot to read/understand the rest of the phrase. No, I did not. Dictionaries try to enumerate all the usual meanings of words. When I teach my Computer Architecture course (in French, I'm in Montreal), I have to make a distrinction between hardware and software, in the first lectures. I use, the term logiciel to mean software, in the broad (yet seldom used) sense, which is indicated above in the definition between parentheses (i.e. not hardware). In other words, ask yourself: what is the opposite of matériel (hardware) in French? Yes, French defines logiciel as the opposite of hardware. There are no other terms, as far as I know. I agree that it is not common to attach this semantic to this word, but it is allowed. Please do not assume that every single word (in French, or in English) has a single meaning (semantics). Most words have a variety of meanings, that can change in a very subtle manner, depending on their context of use. Logiciel is such a word. Etienne PS: Mailing-list usage policy mandates that you not CC me unless I ask for it. As you seem to be a new maintainer (NM), you should be aware of such rules. Please read the section Code of conduct at: http://www.debian.org/MailingLists/ -- Etienne M. Gagnon, Ph.D. http://www.info.uqam.ca/~egagnon/ SableVM: http://www.sablevm.org/ SableCC: http://www.sablecc.org/
Re: Unidentified subject!
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 09:10:07AM +0100, MJ Ray wrote: On 2003-09-22 07:30:41 +0100 Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: And do you really think that every software (of your wide definition) you can have on computer is part of the Operating System? The goal of Debian is to provide an Operating System, isn't it? See http://www.uk.debian.org/intro/about#what Apparently it's clear that Debian do not consider that his very own logo must be free software Has Debian taken a decision on that? Yes. http://www.debian.org/vote/1999/vote_0002 Also see: http://www.debian.org/vote/1999/vote_0005 (Please forgive Darren Benham's inability to spell the word dual.) -- G. Branden Robinson| The more ridiculous a belief Debian GNU/Linux | system, the higher the probability [EMAIL PROTECTED] | of its success. http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- Wayne R. Bartz signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
MJ Ray wrote: It seems a little odd to expect Debian to contain an official statement saying by software, we mean software. Let the people who use bizarre definitions say by software, we don't mean software but this other thing. Given the amount of discussion this topic has started, perhaps it might be a good idea to do it anyway, if only to reduce the confusion for those who are not native speakers of English. In the Debian Project, 'software' means anything that is not hardware. It does not mean just computer programs. Arnoud -- Arnoud Engelfriet, Dutch patent attorney - Speaking only for myself Patents, copyright and IPR explained for techies: http://www.iusmentis.com/
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
On Mon, 22 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: No, it's still a theoretical problem.[1] The above has nothing to do with the content of the statements themselves, merely the fact that they are not free under the DFSG. The problem is that our non-modifiable political essays might be removed from our manuals, if the manuals' licenses permitted that. You have just said you would remove them. We only distribute in Debian things that are DFSG Free. Unmodifiable political essays are not Free. In fact, anything that is unmodifiable[1] cannot be distributed in Debian, be it source code, political essays, or an Ode To a Small Lump of Green Putty I Found In My Armpit One Midsummer Morning. [They're not Free under the 5 freedoms, and they're certainly not Free under the DFSG.] If the political essays were DFSG free, the maintainers would (most likely) be happy to distribute them without modifying them. However, because they are not DFSG free, we cannot distribute them at all. Therefore, the maintainer tries to serve our users by distributing the largest subset that is Free, which forces him to exise the non-Free bits. [Now, we might distribute them in non-free, but frankly, I hope that section goes the way of the dodo relatively soon.] Don Armstrong 1: Ignoring licences and copyright statements, of course. -- It seems intuitively obvious to me, which means that it might be wrong -- Chris Torek http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgproXKeHmtld.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
On Mon, 22 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: But if they were only removable without being modifiable, then yes, removing them would be the only way to include the accompanying documentation while still ensuring that all bits in Debian guarantee the freedoms that we require. Not long ago, people were trying to reassure me that if invariant sections were removable, nobody would remove them. I guess not. If they[1] did, they spoke erroneously. However, what they almost surely said is that if the sections were DFSG Free, we would (probably) not remove them, and it's likely that we wouldn't modify them either. This reinforces my conclusion that it is essential for these sections to be unremovable as well as unmodifiable. To serve the ends of GNU, perhaps. But it doesn't seem to serve the needs of the larger Free Software community. Don Armstrong 1: Whoever they is. I know you draft your messages offline, but it would be usefull if you could dig up a reference to where you are basing these statements on from time to time. Otherwise it is exceedingly difficult to understand where you are comming from. -- Of course Pacman didn't influence us as kids. If it did, we'd be running around in darkened rooms, popping pills and listening to repetitive music. http://www.donarmstrong.com http://www.anylevel.com http://rzlab.ucr.edu pgp8MerXCIzyh.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: License requirements for DSP binaries?
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 11:56:27AM +0200, Josselin Mouette wrote: If the binaries were entirely written using assembly code, the binary here equates the source. You really mean machine code here, right? Because I would appreciate the .s source files if someone wrote it in assembler. Simon
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 13:29]: MJ Ray [EMAIL PROTECTED] a tapoté : Mathieu claims to see no need for derived works of political essays despite all of the suggested reasons which are broadly similar to those for free software I do not agree with your point of view, that's all. We're here in debian-legal. That means, it's not about the personal view, but about the view of debian, and the cause for us discussing is in finding the common view. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
* Mathieu Roy ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030922 15:09]: The point is whether every software needs to be free or just program and their documentation. So, you finally admited that software includes also digital photos of your girlfriend. Wow. Now, then next question is very clear for debian-legal: The Social Contract (and the DFSG) say that all software in Debian must be 100% free. So, the answer for Debian is: Every software. However, everybody is allowed to do it different. He just shouldn't try to urge his non-free software into Debian. Cheers, Andi -- http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/ PGP 1024/89FB5CE5 DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F 3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
Re: Software and its translations (was: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal)
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 01:51:14PM +0200, Roland Mas wrote: - un logiciel can even be used to mean a software program, whereas the phrase a software sounds awkward to me in English (but then again, I'm not a native English speaker, and maybe software is a countable noun -- can you say two softwares?). No. Software is a collective noun, like information or stuff. If I never see these words butchered again into bastardized forms like softwares, informations, and stuffs[1], it will be too soon. [1] though foodstuffs is a valid (if somewhat archaic) term -- G. Branden Robinson| Debian GNU/Linux | Cogitationis poenam nemo meretur. [EMAIL PROTECTED] | http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
Don Armstrong [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: On Mon, 22 Sep 2003, Richard Stallman wrote: But if they were only removable without being modifiable, then yes, removing them would be the only way to include the accompanying documentation while still ensuring that all bits in Debian guarantee the freedoms that we require. Not long ago, people were trying to reassure me that if invariant sections were removable, nobody would remove them. I guess not. If they[1] did, they spoke erroneously. However, what they almost surely said is that if the sections were DFSG Free, we would (probably) not remove them, and it's likely that we wouldn't modify them either. Indeed -- observe the treatment of the KJV Bible, which many Debian developers disagree with even packaging, but which exists as Free Software in Debian: modifyable by Debian's users. I see no reason to believe the political essays of the FSF would receive worse treatment, were they equally free. This reinforces my conclusion that it is essential for these sections to be unremovable as well as unmodifiable. To serve the ends of GNU, perhaps. But it doesn't seem to serve the needs of the larger Free Software community. More to the point, they are removable from Debian, and are apparently likely to be so removed. Functionally equivalent documentation will be written to replace them, presumably forked from the last DFSG-free manuals. So I find your apparent justification for Invariant political tracts -- that without them being Invariant sections tied to the documentation, they won't get enough air time to promote Free Software -- somewhat confusing. It appears they'd get more exposure, not less, from being Free as in Software. -Brian -- Brian T. Sniffen[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/
Re: License requirements for DSP binaries?
On Mon, Sep 22, 2003, Josselin Mouette wrote: If the binaries were entirely written using assembly code, the binary here equates the source. This is very rarely true. Even assembly code has variable and function names, comments and macros. A disassembler output is certainly not the preferred form for modification in most cases. Regards, -- Sam.
Re: PennMUSH license concerns.
On Sun, Sep 21, 2003 at 11:41:52PM -0600, Joel Baker wrote: [snip] See above; the concern is not over any specific piece of code (in that the only ones I can point to, I'm fairly sure the license can be clarified for), but in whether debian-legal is willing to accept the statements of (in particular) Lydia Leong and David Passmore on the matter, since they can be demonstrated as false in at least one circumstance, today. In fairness, in terms of *probability*, any random bit of code taken from 2.2.5 is *likely* to be under an acceptable license, stipulating that the 2.0 relicense is acceptable (which I'm not contradicting); the 3.x code, even moreso (since much of the reason 2.2.5 was released had to do with updates Unoff 1 made after a long period of issues with the maintenence of the official 2.2 series, but the 3.x series rewrote a significant amount of code). Unless PennMUSH happened to get a poison pill, it wouldn't actually have any problems (unlike TinyMUSH 3.x, which, last I looked, still did). To be honest, I have my doubts as to whether it would even be possible to track down every possible incidence, and I suspect that the only practical solution, given the code history, would be to take a solve problems as they appear approach - if someone asserts an issue, either get them to relicense the code, or have upstream replace the code. If debian-legal is comfortable with that approach, I'm certainly happy to bribe, cajole, and nerf-bat Mr. Grizzard until he agrees to a relicense under suitable terms, and thus resolve the only outstanding issue I have concrete evidence of (this d-l decision would presumably also apply to the ITP for TinyMUSH 3, as well). In my opinion, we have made a reasonable and good-faith effort to verify the licensing. If the issue has been researched, and no one can point to any explicit license problems, then that should be sufficient. It is not common practice in the free software community to have contributors swear out an affidavit regarding the copyright ancestry of their contributions. If some copyright holder somwhere feels his privileges are being infringed, then the onus is on them to bring the issue to our attention. We have been anything but careless. I do not think it is reasonable to expect the Debian Project or the other PennMUSH copyright holders to go to lengths usually reserved for tracking down wanted criminals to locate other copyright holders whose intentions can be reasonably conjectured. Note the contrast between this situation and the Sun RPC license issue, where the explicit terms of the only known license under which the code has been distributed are clearly non-DFSG-free, but we're keeping the code in main based on the hearsay testimony of unknown individuals attesting to a clarification whose terms are themselves unknown. But hey, if that's good enough for the Release Manager and Project Leader, I guess it should be good enough for the rest of us, right? -- G. Branden Robinson| Human beings rarely imagine a god Debian GNU/Linux | that behaves any better than a [EMAIL PROTECTED] | spoiled child. http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- Robert Heinlein signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
Mathieu Roy [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Now, I think that the question is not really what the DFSG allows. Because it's pretty clear that the DSFG does not allow GFDLed documentation with Invariant section. The question is: do we think that tolerating this non-DFSG essays in some GFDLed documentation is more harmful to Debian than removing these GNU manuals? Of course! Leaving them in main weakens our principles and opens the door to abuse. Moving the manuals to non-free doesn't mean they are no longer available. I personally don't care very much if the Emacs and Emacs Lisp manuals don't get rewritten as free software. I'll get them from non-free and at least it's being honest about the freeness of the content. Get over out, it's not a huge deal. I'd rather we work with the FSF in getting the GFDL free is used without Invariant Sections or covers. That way at least some manuals can go into main, just not most that are published by the FSF. Peter
Re: stepping in between Debian and FSF
On Mon, Sep 08, 2003 at 10:53:56AM -0500, John Goerzen wrote: Not entirely. My proposal to remove non-free from our archives and amend the social contract to state that it will no longer be available on our FTP servers is what is in the air. [s/state that it will no longer/no longer state that it will/, as you notetd.] We can, without making any change to the social contract or requiring any GR, create a separate /debian-non-free archive on our mirror system, and change the base system to provide no reference to it. And likewise, we can amend the Social Contract to longer engrave in iron our commitment to continue distributing non-free software. In other words, we can make it no longer a violation of the Social Contract to stop providing FTP access to a non-free software archive, but continue to provide it for other reasons. That issue is more personally important to me. I want us to be able to evaluate the utility of non-free on purely pragmatic grounds, instead of locking ourselves via the Social Contract into distributing non-free via FTP. We could then either cut non-free loose as an ordinary operational decision, establish some sort of criteria under which it would be automatically dropped, or put non-free under the control of some delegate or committee. Essentially, divorcing non-free from the Social Contract gives us *more* freedom to deal with it as we wish, not less. -- G. Branden Robinson|To Republicans, limited government Debian GNU/Linux |means not assisting people they [EMAIL PROTECTED] |would sooner see shoveled into mass http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |graves. -- Kenneth R. Kahn signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Unidentified subject!
None of these differences correctly classifies Hello as both a program and documentation, as far as I can tell. Hello is an example program. It is difficult to deal with such grey areas and I assume that it requires a case-by-case review. I have never found it difficult. When it's hard to decide, neither choice is really wrong, so pick whichever seems better.
Re: There was never a chance of a GFDL compromise
But if they were only removable without being modifiable, then yes, removing them would be the only way to include the accompanying documentation while still ensuring that all bits in Debian guarantee the freedoms that we require. Not long ago, people were trying to reassure me that if invariant sections were removable, nobody would remove them. I guess not. This reinforces my conclusion that it is essential for these sections to be unremovable as well as unmodifiable.
Re: A possible GFDL compromise: a proposal
If, OTOH, your only goal is to persuade Debian to accept the GFDL with invariant sections as free enough for inclusion in our distribution, I don't see that such a discussion could ever bear fruit without a concrete proposal spelling out the alternative guidelines that should apply to documentation. I don't plan to discuss even small GFDL changes here. I think people will present a proposal for guidelines for free documentation for Debian. The definition of software that includes documentation is simply the only one that permits Debian to include documentation at all, and only if it complies with the DFSG. I've mentioned the other possible choices, so there's no need for repetition now.
