Suggested small improvements to the (already excellent) DFSG FAQ
[Barak Pearlmutter's mail comes back no matter how I send it, so I am posting to the list] The FAQ is very good. Here are some suggestions for further improvement. 26. [...] OSS was also meant to sound more professional and hence more attractive to businesses. You might also mention after this that it turned out that the term 'open source' could not be registered as a trademark in the United States after all. And it contains an even more serious ambiguity that the word 'free', in that some companies open their source code for people to examine without granting them the right to make changes or to pass on copies. Bruce Perens himself has confessed that coining a competing term might not have been such a great idea. http://linuxtoday.com/developer/1999061503710NWSM The problem of the ambiguity with the word 'free' is best resolved NOT by saying 'free as in speech' (since the freedom we are concerned about is not exactly the same freedom as the freedom of speech) NOR by adopting the word 'libre', but by speaking where necessary about software freedom or freedom to write, share and use software. Bruce Perns Perens 27. [...] Debian encourages corporations to create products based on Debian GNU/Linux, and such corporations include or have included Progeny, Lindows, Corel, and others. Progeny GNU/Linux is no more. Corel Linux has become Xandros. The Corel link links to some funny site about Hell. 28. [...] Automation and increased efficiency often reduce the number of jobs in some category and this is something we accept--- buggy whip manufacturers come to mind. 'Buggy whip manufacturers' traditionally refers to an industry, not to a profession. You could say 'coal miners' or 'hatters'. 29. [...] The name is a bit of a joke, as the term comes from the Four Freedoms Speech delivered by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in which he ... I suggest: The term 'four freedoms' is a play on words used by the American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in a speech in which he ... -- Thomas Hood
Re: Suggested small improvements to the (already excellent) DFSG FAQ
There's also: 15. Q: Why are almost all these dual licenses dualed with the GNU GPL? ... QPL is under GNU/Qt ... It doesn't make much sense, I think the author means something like Qt is under GPL/QPL. :-) -- Romain FRANCOISE [EMAIL PROTECTED] | When we were kids, we hated it's a miracle -- http://orebokech.com/ | things our parents did.
Re: mplayer licenses
It has been pointed out on debian-devel that your mplayer package includes DVD Content Scrambling System decoding!: http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200307/msg01827.html (Refer libmpdvdkit2/*css*) I hope you understand how serious this is and how many problems you would have caused Debian by having this accepted for distribution. Please get up to speed on such issues and take a look at how xine-ui is packaged. Regards, Adam
Re: mplayer licenses
Adam Warner wrote: I'm please to see what has been done Andrea. I believe the copyright file can be improved by these completely unofficial suggestions (suggestions start with *): This package was first debianized by * TeLeNiEkO * [EMAIL PROTECTED] on Mon, 26 Feb 2001 12:24:04 +0100. Original source can be found at: http://www.mplayerHQ.hu/homepage/ Copyrighted by various authors. Licensed under the terms of GNU GPL. See /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL for details. * How is mplayer licensed under the terms of the GPL when I can't find a licence statement in the original distribution? (perhaps my grepping was incomplete). I thought it was odd that you didn't list the mplayer copyright holders in the above paragraph. Maybe the reason is you couldn't find them. The only reference to mplayer being licensed under the GPL in the original sources is that it contains a debian subdirectory containing the above comment. While I'm aware that mplayer can't be legally licensed under anything but the GPL (given the way the GPL is constructed) it would be nice if mplayer actually contained a LICENSE file or equivalent. mplayer is more than the sum of its parts. Thankfully I have located such a statement on the website: http://www.mplayerhq.hu/homepage/design6/info.html License MPlayer can be distributed under the GPL v2 license. Please amend the copyright file to refer to the GNU GPL version 2. And link to the website licence statement. Hopefully upstream will make this clearer in a future release. OK --- libvo/vo_pgm.c libvo/vo_md5.c * Copyright (C) 1996, MPEG Software Simulation Group. All Rights Reserved. ... WAL [2nd e-mail] OK. I looked again, but I could not find anything WAL from the MSSG reference decoder there. I think it's clean. AMS so the copyright is bogus. The Debian patches the above two AMS files to refer to this explanation. * These files now refer to a non-existing file: * (Mennucc1: the copyright was bogus. Read README.Debian.2) I'd suggest this rewrite: * (Mennucc1: MPEG Software Simulation Group copyright no longer applies as the reference decoder was rewritten. Refer /usr/share/doc/mplayer/copyright for details) OK ... * Please consider looking up and quoting this mail and patching xa_gsm.c with a comment that the code is distributed under the GPL. This info contradicts comments in the file that indicate it is permissively licensed (with a request to be informed about uses and bugs--it's only a request so it's DFSG-free). I will ask Gabucino there is still a (minor) unresolved issue (sorry if I am incorrect in the below part... I am no good at 'legal') during the flames in 2002-03 in debian-legal, it was pointed out that , since mplayer contains many GPL code from other GPL libraries, with heavy modifications, and since GPL asks that such modifications be in some ways declared, this shoul be done * The above makes you look unprofessional. Quote the relevant section of the GPL v2: 2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions: a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change. State that many of the files are missing changelogs. OK on the other hand, the mplayer docs and source usually references many many what? the copyright file is incomplete. CORRECTED ... so , I have just added a statement in README.Debian * Your distribution doesn't contain a README.Debian file! (note the capitalisation). * README.Debian (when renamed) renamed You refer to debian/changelog. The changelog states: * uploaded to Debian. The source code was scrutinized for licenses and copyrights. Read debian/changelog for a detailed discussion. The changelog tells one to read the changelog!. Can you also provide the path to the correct file when installed. corrected * Could you rewrite this paragraph in a way that is less disparaging of your fellow developers: ``I personally want to trust that a piece of code stating GPL or LGPL is indeed DFSG complaint; if mantainers were so paranoids as to NOT trust licenses in source files (and e.g. think that the code may come from a non-free project but was simply relabelled), then it would be humanly impossible to add code to Debian at all. And similarly for tracking any change to any code: this requirement would make it so hard to actually reuse the code, that it void the spirit of GPL, that is, have code, will share, everybody enjoys.'' I believe your point can be expressed in this sentence: I trust that code purporting to be the copyright of a
Re: Unable to contact author of DFSG FAQ
Sorry about that. The mail server I use crashed, and during restoration the sysadmin turned on the SMTP server before restoring the accounts, unceremoniously bouncing days of incoming queued email. I should be reachable again. And if anyone wants a relaxing job as sysadmin of a friendly department in lovely Ireland, please contact me. -- Barak A. Pearlmutter [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hamilton Institute, NUI Maynooth, Co. Kildare, Ireland http://www-bcl.cs.may.ie/~barak/
Re: mplayer licenses
sorry last time there was a discussion, it was mainly on licenses and copyrights, and I was so focused on them that I didn't think of the CSS code I will prepare and test an 'mplayer' without the above code (a la xine) and come back soon On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 10:56:50PM +1200, Adam Warner wrote: It has been pointed out on debian-devel that your mplayer package includes DVD Content Scrambling System decoding!: http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200307/msg01827.html (Refer libmpdvdkit2/*css*) I hope you understand how serious this is and how many problems you would have caused Debian by having this accepted for distribution. Please get up to speed on such issues and take a look at how xine-ui is packaged. Regards, Adam -- Andrea Mennucc E' un mondo difficile. Che vita intensa! (Tonino Carotone) pgp9SAKOAloba.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: GNU FDL and Debian
... To the extent that the GFDL caters for the wishes of publishers at all, it is in that it makes it inconvenient for *competing* publishers to publish and sell hardcopies. ... I'm not quite tracking you there. The GFDL isn't supposed to have that effect, at least as I read it, and as I understood RMS's messages. Maybe it does though, but even if so that's not really the point. The FSF wouldn't consider such an effect desirable, so that's not a reason they'd use to decide against going dual GFDL/GPL.
Re: GNU FDL and Debian
Scripsit Barak Pearlmutter [EMAIL PROTECTED] ... To the extent that the GFDL caters for the wishes of publishers at all, it is in that it makes it inconvenient for *competing* publishers to publish and sell hardcopies. ... I'm not quite tracking you there. The GFDL isn't supposed to have that effect, at least as I read it, and as I understood RMS's messages. It's the only reason I can see why a publisher would prefer GFDL to plain GPL. Do you see something that I'm missing? Maybe it does though, but even if so that's not really the point. The FSF wouldn't consider such an effect desirable, Sure? In many cases the FSF itself is the publisher, hence the mandatory Cover Texts on GNU manuals saying that you're a bad person if you buy a hardcopy not published by the FSF. -- Henning Makholm Han råber og skriger, vakler ud på kørebanen og ind på fortorvet igen, hæver knytnæven mod en bil, hilser overmådigt venligt på en mor med barn, bryder ud i sang og stiller sig til sidst op og pisser i en port.
Re: mplayer licenses
On Fri, 2003-07-25 at 01:41, A Mennucc1 wrote: sorry last time there was a discussion, it was mainly on licenses and copyrights, and I was so focused on them that I didn't think of the CSS code I will prepare and test an 'mplayer' without the above code (a la xine) and come back soon Thanks. I hope there's no chance your 23 July upload to the new package queue could be approved: http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200307/msg01731.html This will also be one of those cases where the code has to be removed from the original tar.gz. Regards, Adam
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 03:43:19PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote: [...] I still think it would be hard for the defendant to convince a court that he was ignorant of the *de facto* convention that people put (c) in computer programs to assert their copyright. Actually, the convention is Copyright (c), which meets the requirements anyway because of the explicit Copyright. I've never seen anyone put (c) by itself without the Copyright. (This is also why I'm wondering why this is being argued about at all. Just write Copyright (c) or just Copyright and be done with it. If you really want to save keystrokes and write just (c), then don't come crying to me if you don't get punitive damages :-) Richard Braakman
Re: mplayer licenses
On Fri, Jul 25, 2003 at 02:51:19AM +1200, Adam Warner wrote: Thanks. I hope there's no chance your 23 July upload to the new package queue could be approved: There's very little chance that anything called mplayer could be approved :P -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -- | pgpTTNtJvKkTe.pgp Description: PGP signature
Bug#202723: perl-doc: Non-free manpage included
Package: perl-doc Version: 5.8.0-18 Severity: serious Justification: Policy 2.2.1 Hi, It seems that perlreftut(1) is quite non DFSG-free. Here is an extract from the bottom of the manpage: Distribution Conditions Copyright 1998 The Perl Journal. When included as part of the Standard Version of Perl, or as part of its complete documentation whether printed or otherwise, this work may be distributed only under the terms of Perl's Artistic License. Any distribution of this file or derivatives thereof outside of that package require that special arrangements be made with copyright holder. Thanks, Guido -- Guido Trotter Jabber ID: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Public PGP key available on: http://www.cs.unibo.it/~trotter/
Re: Implied vs. explicit copyright
On Thu, 2003-07-24 at 16:04, Richard Braakman wrote: On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 03:43:19PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote: [...] I still think it would be hard for the defendant to convince a court that he was ignorant of the *de facto* convention that people put (c) in computer programs to assert their copyright. Actually, the convention is Copyright (c), which meets the requirements anyway because of the explicit Copyright. I've never seen anyone put (c) by itself without the Copyright. (This is also why I'm wondering why this is being argued about at all. Just write Copyright (c) or just Copyright and be done with it. If you really want to save keystrokes and write just (c), then don't come crying to me if you don't get punitive damages :-) Especially as Copyright is a fairly global thing, so the exact laws differ from country to country anyway. I mentioned this thread to my solicitor earlier, just out of pure interest, and he was on the opinion that as (c) or (C) are the most common, not to mention closest, representation of the symbol in computer source code that any sane judge would accept them (in the UK, at least). Though a Copyright notice here does little other than assert the name of the author of the work, for identification purposes only. All work is inherently copyrighted and there is significant test case that I couldn't find a copyright notice is not a valid defence for breach. Scott -- Who isn't a lawyer :-) signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part
Re: Bug#202723: perl-doc: Non-free manpage included
Scripsit Guido Trotter [EMAIL PROTECTED] It seems that perlreftut(1) is quite non DFSG-free. So it does. It will have to be relicensed or removed. (This does not add much, I know, but I felt the cc: to debian-legal ought to result in some kind of response from us d-l people). -- Henning Makholm However, the fact that the utterance by Epimenides of that false sentence could imply the existence of some Cretan who is not a liar is rather unsettling.
