Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Richard Brown]

On Tue 1. Aug 2017 at 22:29, Luigi Baldoni  wrote:

> Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 10:30 PM
> From: "Richard Brown" 
> > > On Tue 1. Aug 2017 at 20:42, Luigi Baldoni  aloi...@gmx.com]> wrote:Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 6:02 PM
> > >
> > > No. I was talking about the copyring attribution for the spec file
> itself, with which I seem to recall
> > > from a previous interaction OP has a problem with.
> > >
> > > Now, I assume that a commercial entity like SUSE can't afford to
> distribute anything where the IP is not
> > > clearly defined, even for a mere script.
> > >
> > > Would Packman be more lenient in that regard?
> >
> > I don't know if Packman would be lenient or not in the scenario you
> pose, but that isn't relevant to the actual risk with Mr. Feys proposed
> comtributions.
> >
> > The behaviour with Walter alludes to in his post was a clear,
> demonstrable case of Mr. Fey taking sources (in this case spec files) and
> reusing the spec file, in whole
> > or in part, while simultaneously removing the copyright header from
> those spec files.
> >
> > The spec files were all licensed under licenses such as the GPL and MIT
> which require all copyright attribution to be preserved as part of the
> license for reuse and
> > redistribution.
> >
> > Mr. Feys insistence to remove the copyright attribution while reusing
> source which clearly derived from clearly attributed specfiles is a clear
> breach of the licenses
> > involved and in the interest of the copyright holders, the upstream
> projects who chose the licenses in use, and all open source projects the
> openSUSE Board requested
> > Mr Fey cease that behaviour.
> >
> > Mr Fey now seems to seek to use Packman and his posts imply he might
> intend to do so in the same manner in which he chose to use the openSUSE
> Build service.
> >
> > If that is the case, this could be a serious issue for the Packman build
> service. If the sources involved include files derived from those
> copyrighted to SUSE Linux
> > GmbH it is likely that SUSE will notice (after all, I have read this
> thread) and it is certainly likely we will be compelled to take action to
> protect our copyright
> > and the redistribution license of the packages in question.
>
> > And that's a situation I really, sincerely hope we can avoid so hope
> that Packman has suitable processes and options in place to ensure the
> licenses and copyrights of
> > their contributions are as checked as they reasonably can be before
> hosting and redistributing the resulting binaries.
>
> I didn't say anything of the sort and I'm sorry if I gave that impression.


Nothing to apologise for, this is a polite conversation between curious
parties


>
> In my understanding (and I could be wrong), Walter Fey opposes copyright
> headers for spec files even
> when he's the original author.


Such an approach is inconsistent with the openSUSE Project where we clearly
state all spec files must have a license header including a copyright
attribution

https://en.opensuse.org/openSUSE:Specfile_guidelines#Specfile_Licensing

We do not require copyright attribution transfer and fully support our
contributors to assert their own copyright if they are the sole author, or
share attribution with multiple parties if the specfile includes the work
of multiple parties.

In the case of the openSUSE Project we consider all of our specifies to
have the same license as the associated source, unless it is not an open
source license in which case the specfile is MIT.

As all major open source licenses require clear copyright attribution to be
valid, any removal of copyright attribution when reusing openSUSE specfiles
is a breach of the license in question.

This is a common practice that is followed throughout the open source
world, for example the FSF have the following guides even on the topic.

https://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.en.html

So this is not just a question of corporate concern, but the correct, and
secure, way to ensure that the terms and conditions are enforceable for the
software author as intended under their chosen license.

If Packman plays too fast and loose with such good practice I can imagine
some very uncomfortable possibilities.

Given most open source licenses have strict rules regarding redistribution,
I cannot imagine it is a good thing for any service hosting open source
software to turn a blind eye to the terms, conditions and copyrights of the
software they are distributing.

Just my 2c and sharing from my own personal experience


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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Luigi Baldoni]

Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 10:30 PM
From: "Richard Brown" 
> > On Tue 1. Aug 2017 at 20:42, Luigi Baldoni 
> >  wrote:Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 
> > 2017 at 6:02 PM
> > 
> > No. I was talking about the copyring attribution for the spec file itself, 
> > with which I seem to recall
> > from a previous interaction OP has a problem with.
> >
> > Now, I assume that a commercial entity like SUSE can't afford to distribute 
> > anything where the IP is not
> > clearly defined, even for a mere script.
> > 
> > Would Packman be more lenient in that regard?
> 
> I don't know if Packman would be lenient or not in the scenario you pose, but 
> that isn't relevant to the actual risk with Mr. Feys proposed comtributions.
> 
> The behaviour with Walter alludes to in his post was a clear, demonstrable 
> case of Mr. Fey taking sources (in this case spec files) and reusing the spec 
> file, in whole
> or in part, while simultaneously removing the copyright header from those 
> spec files.
>  
> The spec files were all licensed under licenses such as the GPL and MIT which 
> require all copyright attribution to be preserved as part of the license for 
> reuse and
> redistribution.
>  
> Mr. Feys insistence to remove the copyright attribution while reusing source 
> which clearly derived from clearly attributed specfiles is a clear breach of 
> the licenses
> involved and in the interest of the copyright holders, the upstream projects 
> who chose the licenses in use, and all open source projects the openSUSE 
> Board requested 
> Mr Fey cease that behaviour.
> 
> Mr Fey now seems to seek to use Packman and his posts imply he might intend 
> to do so in the same manner in which he chose to use the openSUSE Build 
> service.
>  
> If that is the case, this could be a serious issue for the Packman build 
> service. If the sources involved include files derived from those copyrighted 
> to SUSE Linux 
> GmbH it is likely that SUSE will notice (after all, I have read this thread) 
> and it is certainly likely we will be compelled to take action to protect our 
> copyright 
> and the redistribution license of the packages in question.
 
> And that's a situation I really, sincerely hope we can avoid so hope that 
> Packman has suitable processes and options in place to ensure the licenses 
> and copyrights of
> their contributions are as checked as they reasonably can be before hosting 
> and redistributing the resulting binaries.

I didn't say anything of the sort and I'm sorry if I gave that impression.

In my understanding (and I could be wrong), Walter Fey opposes copyright 
headers for spec files even
when he's the original author.

Hence my perplexity.

Now, I don't know if you know more about whatever happened on OBS or if the 
specfile skeleton itself is subject
to copyright, but it would be useful to hear it straight from the horse's mouth.

Regards

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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Richard Brown]

On Tue 1. Aug 2017 at 20:42, Luigi Baldoni  wrote:

> Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 6:02 PM
> From: "Richard Brown" 
> > I would hope the answer is "no"
> >
> > If Packman receives packages which clearly remove the legal copyright
> attribution of previous authors, Packman would
> > need to be prepared for serious conversations with the copyright holder
> who's attributions are being removed.
> >
> > This is a very serious situation which fundamentally undermines the
> legal basis under which free and open source
> > licenses operate, so is taken very seriously by corporations that run
> their business in compliance with those
> > licenses.
>
> No. I was talking about the copyring attribution for the spec file itself,
> with which I seem to recall
> from a previous interaction OP has a problem with.
>
> Now, I assume that a commercial entity like SUSE can't afford to
> distribute anything where the IP is not
> clearly defined, even for a mere script.
>
> Would Packman be more lenient in that regard?
>
> Regard
>
>
I don't know if Packman would be lenient or not in the scenario you pose,
but that isn't relevant to the actual risk with Mr. Feys proposed
comtributions.

The behaviour with Walter alludes to in his post was a clear, demonstrable
case of Mr. Fey taking sources (in this case spec files) and reusing the
spec file, in whole or in part, while simultaneously removing the copyright
header from those spec files.

The spec files were all licensed under licenses such as the GPL and MIT
which require all copyright attribution to be preserved as part of the
license for reuse and redistribution.

Mr. Feys insistence to remove the copyright attribution while reusing
source which clearly derived from clearly attributed specfiles is a clear
breach of the licenses involved and in the interest of the copyright
holders, the upstream projects who chose the licenses in use, and all open
source projects the openSUSE Board requested Mr Fey cease that behaviour.

Mr Fey now seems to seek to use Packman and his posts imply he might intend
to do so in the same manner in which he chose to use the openSUSE Build
service.

If that is the case, this could be a serious issue for the Packman build
service. If the sources involved include files derived from those
copyrighted to SUSE Linux GmbH it is likely that SUSE will notice (after
all, I have read this thread) and it is certainly likely we will be
compelled to take action to protect our copyright and the redistribution
license of the packages in question.

And that's a situation I really, sincerely hope we can avoid so hope that
Packman has suitable processes and options in place to ensure the licenses
and copyrights of their contributions are as checked as they reasonably can
be before hosting and redistributing the resulting binaries.

Regards,

- R

>
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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Luigi Baldoni]

Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 6:02 PM
From: "Richard Brown" 
> > > You mean the spec file, changes file etc when you refer to 'form'?
> >
> > If so I suspect it's related to the missing header with copyright 
> > attribution
> > to SUSE AG.
> >
> > Now, the question is: would Packman be ok with that?
>
> I would hope the answer is "no"
>
> If Packman receives packages which clearly remove the legal copyright 
> attribution of previous authors, Packman would
> need to be prepared for serious conversations with the copyright holder who's 
> attributions are being removed.
>
> This is a very serious situation which fundamentally undermines the legal 
> basis under which free and open source
> licenses operate, so is taken very seriously by corporations that run their 
> business in compliance with those
> licenses.
 
No. I was talking about the copyring attribution for the spec file itself, with 
which I seem to recall
from a previous interaction OP has a problem with.

Now, I assume that a commercial entity like SUSE can't afford to distribute 
anything where the IP is not
clearly defined, even for a mere script.

Would Packman be more lenient in that regard?

Regard


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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Richard Brown]

On Tue 1. Aug 2017 at 15:33, Luigi Baldoni  wrote:

> Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 2:22 PM
> From: Malcolm 
> >
> > >A few weeks ago I was informed by somebody, who is member of the
> > >openSUSE Board and employee of the SUSE GmbH, that the form as this
> > >was done for more than ten years is not welcome anymore.
> > 
> > Hi
> > You mean the spec file, changes file etc when you refer to 'form'?
>
> If so I suspect it's related to the missing header with copyright
> attribution
> to SUSE AG.
>
> Now, the question is: would Packman be ok with that?


I would hope the answer is "no"

If Packman receives packages which clearly remove the legal copyright
attribution of previous authors, Packman would need to be prepared for
serious conversations with the copyright holder who's attributions are
being removed.

This is a very serious situation which fundamentally undermines the legal
basis under which free and open source licenses operate, so is taken very
seriously by corporations that run their business in compliance with those
licenses.

Regards,
Richard Brown
openSUSE Chairman
SUSE Linux GmbH


>
> Regards
>
>
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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Luigi Baldoni]

Sent: Tuesday, August 01, 2017 at 2:22 PM
From: Malcolm 
>
> >A few weeks ago I was informed by somebody, who is member of the 
> >openSUSE Board and employee of the SUSE GmbH, that the form as this
> >was done for more than ten years is not welcome anymore.
> 
> Hi
> You mean the spec file, changes file etc when you refer to 'form'?

If so I suspect it's related to the missing header with copyright attribution
to SUSE AG.

Now, the question is: would Packman be ok with that?

Regards
 

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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Malcolm]

On Tue 01 Aug 2017 01:31:05 PM CDT, Walter Fey wrote:

>>  
> From the very beginning SUSE LINUX contained a lot of hamradio
> related 
>packages. In 2005 these hamradio packages were dropped from the
>official distribution. A few hamradio operators and LINUX enthusiasts
>took this packages and started the hamradio project at openSUSE. Most
>of the packages that are available today in hamradio were started
>after this. I joined this group in 2008. Meanwhile all of the initial
>maintainers are no longer active and most of the improvements, updates
>and new packages during the last years were done by me.
>A few weeks ago I was informed by somebody, who is member of the 
>openSUSE Board and employee of the SUSE GmbH, that the form as this
>was done for more than ten years is not welcome anymore.

Hi
You mean the spec file, changes file etc when you refer to 'form'?

Nothing stopping you copying the whole hamradio development project to
your home on OBS and publishing from there.

-- 
Cheers Malcolm °¿° SUSE Knowledge Partner (Linux Counter #276890)
openSUSE Leap 42.2 | GNOME 3.20.2 | 4.4.74-18.20-default
HP 255 G4 Notebook | A6-6310 X4 @ 1.80 GHz | AMD Radeon R4
up 15 days 11:59, 1 user, load average: 0.19, 0.57, 0.60



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Re: [packman] New packages for packman (Walter Fey)

[Walter Fey]

Message: 2
Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2017 19:35:34 +0200
From: Hans-Peter Jansen
To:packman@links2linux.de
Subject: Re: [packman] New packages for packman
Message-ID: <5199470.tWIjIzyoY5@xrated>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

On Montag, 31. Juli 2017 15:31:03 Walter Fey wrote:

Dear Packman Team

Thank you for the access to PMBS.

I added some hamradio related packages which are not available in the
official openSUSE distributions to my home project/subproject
"home:dl8fcl:hamradio". One package "gpredict" is available in Leap 42.3
as an old version. It is a fork of the package I was maintaining for a
long time. All these and more packages were maintained and updated by me
at the openSUSE Build Service, project hamradio.

Meanwhile I do not update this openSUSE project any longer and like to
submit these packages to a project in PMBS from were they could be
published.

Mind elaborating on your reasons on this move?

Please check my answer to Luigi Baldonis mail further down in the text.

Cheers,
Pete


--

Message: 3
Date: Mon, 31 Jul 2017 19:54:48 +0200
From: "Luigi Baldoni"
To:packman@links2linux.de
Subject: Re: [packman] New packages for packman
Message-ID:



Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8

Sent: Monday, July 31, 2017 at 3:31 PM
From: "Walter Fey"

I added some hamradio related packages which are not available in the
official openSUSE distributions to my home project/subproject
"home:dl8fcl:hamradio". One package "gpredict" is available in Leap 42.3
as an old version. It is a fork of the package I was maintaining for a
long time. All these and more packages were maintained and updated by me
at the openSUSE Build Service, project hamradio.

I thought packman was, for the most part, reserved to packages that (chiefly
for legal reasons) couldn't be hosted on OBS.

The Packman Homepage says:
"What is the Packman team doing ?
We build software packages to enable users to easily install and remove 
software on Linux.
More specifically, we do so for software that is not shipped as part of 
distributions or that are

shipped as an outdated version."
I think these packages meet this.

May we ask what's wrong
with the hamradio project?

From the very beginning SUSE LINUX contained a lot of hamradio related 
packages. In 2005 these hamradio packages were dropped from the official 
distribution. A few hamradio operators and LINUX enthusiasts took this 
packages and started the hamradio project at openSUSE. Most of the 
packages that are available today in hamradio were started after this. I 
joined this group in 2008. Meanwhile all of the initial maintainers are 
no longer active and most of the improvements, updates and new packages 
during the last years were done by me.
A few weeks ago I was informed by somebody, who is member of the 
openSUSE Board and employee of the SUSE GmbH, that the form as this was 
done for more than ten years is not welcome anymore.



Meanwhile I do not update this openSUSE project any longer and like to
submit these packages to a project in PMBS from were they could be
published.
I do not intend to move all packages to PMBS, only the ones which I 
think are most interesting. One package,  r2t2gui, had not published in 
openSUSE hamradio before. I developed and test it during the last weeks 
in my home project.

They could be published, but they would also need to be maintained as much
as on OBS.
I mean, I get the part about not having time anymore, but what's the
difference compared to where they are now?
A nice side effect of this change can be, that the Packman repository is 
well known and the packages can be found easier by people who are 
looking for hamradio programs.
It would be pleasure for me to continue updating and maintaining these 
packages, now in the PMBS.


Best regards, Walter DL8FCL


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