Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
After some time, I came back. Thanks a lot for all replies. I will file a bug now. Regards, Eriberto
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
On 19/10/15 17:26, Ian Jackson wrote: A copyright licence does not need to be in writing. (In the UK, at least[1], and I would be surprised it if were different elsewhere.) Of course in practice it is a good idea to have a clear and explicit statement, in writing, but that doesn't mean that a license can't be implied (or oral, for that matter). Let me surprise you then. At least in Russia and in the Ukraine a copyright license should be in writing (with certain exceptions, but there is no software licenses among them). This is clearly stated in the Civil Code of the Russian Federation, article 1286, paragraph 2 [1] and in the Civil Code of the Ukraine, article 1107, paragraph 2 [2] respectively. [1]: https://www.consultant.ru/document/cons_doc_LAW_64629/5023e7ec1885fe99c14e29a9e328c664a001f599/ [2]: http://www.intellect.ua/patent/law/code/civilcode/75/1107
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Ian Jackson writes:
> Ben Finney writes ("Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?"):
> > The ‘CHANGES’ file contains an entry under “October 2002”:
> >
> > October 2002
> > - Released version 2.5.3
> > - Start moving mapge into the GPL...
>
> Can we tell who wrote that ? If the author of the questionable file is
> also the author of the changelog entry, and also added a copy of the
> relevant GPL, then that seems to me to be a clear statement of intent,
> which is what is necessary.
It's not a clear statement of intent, IMO; at best it is a “note to
self” for some *future* action, not yet achieved.
Even if that could be taken as a statement of intent, there are
conflicting statements of rather clearer intent: the existing, explicit
grants of more restrictive license conditions in the rest of the code
base.
Those intents are incompatible, and so there is no consistent license
that the Debian Project can assume. The conflict would need to be
resolved, preferably by the copyright holders removing the more
restrictive license statements, and making unambiguous license grants as
described in the GNU GPL's instructions.
> Of course in practice it is a good idea to have a clear and explicit
> statement, in writing, but that doesn't mean that a license can't be
> implied (or oral, for that matter).
Right, I meant that the Debian Project will need it in writing. Unless
you know better, I think the FTP masters are not willing to take an oral
statement as sufficient for distributing a work in the Debian system
world-wide under implied license that can't be verified later.
--
\ “Teach a man to make fire, and he will be warm for a day. Set a |
`\ man on fire, and he will be warm for the rest of his life.” |
_o__) —John A. Hrastar |
Ben Finney
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Ben Finney writes ("Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?"):
> Eriberto Mota writes:
> > Well, I need your opinions about what to do. Should be this package
> > moved to non-free? Must it be removed? Am I wrong?
>
> The ‘CHANGES’ file contains an entry under “October 2002”:
>
> October 2002
> - Released version 2.5.3
> - Start moving mapge into the GPL...
Can we tell who wrote that ? If the author of the questionable file
is also the author of the changelog entry, and also added a copy of
the relevant GPL, then that seems to me to be a clear statement of
intent, which is what is necessary.
> This at least suggests the upstream developer at the time of that entry
> intended to explicitly change the license of the whole work to GNU
> General Public License.
>
> You could contact the upstream copyright holder, cite that changelog
> entry, and request they follow the instructions in GNU GPL v3 to
> effectively grant license for every part of the work to all recipients.
It would be fine to contact the relevant copyright holder.
> There needs to be an explicit written grant of license to the recipient,
> preferably in the work itself and not conflicting with any other
> notices (so those conflicting notices should be removed by the copyright
> holder who wrote them).
A copyright licence does not need to be in writing. (In the UK, at
least[1], and I would be surprised it if were different elsewhere.)
Of course in practice it is a good idea to have a clear and explicit
statement, in writing, but that doesn't mean that a license can't be
implied (or oral, for that matter).
Ian.
[1] I don't have a concrete reference for this, but it is clear at
least from the way that parts of the CDPA 1988 (for example
101A(1)(b)(i)) makes an explicit condition that the licence is in
writing.
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Le Sun, Oct 18, 2015 at 06:23:50PM -0200, Eriberto Mota a écrit : > > When migrating the debian/copyright file to 1.0 format, I did a full > revision in source code and I found two doubtful situations for me. > > The first issue is the license used by mpage: > > * Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim > * copies of this document as received, in any medium, provided > * that this copyright notice is preserved, and that the > * distributor grants the recipient permission for further > * redistribution as permitted by this notice. > > IMO, this license doesn't allow modify the source code. So, this > license is inadequate. > > The second issue is the license of the Contrib/mfix/test.ps file: > > % Copyright (c) 1986-89, ArborText, Inc. > % Permission to copy is granted so long as the PostScript code > % is not resold or used in a commercial product. Hi Eriberto, just a side comment since you already had a lot of good answers. When encountering strange license terms, I always look for them in codesearch.debian.net. It can either suggest that the license is not problematic (for instance if it is found in a large number of high-profile packages), or it gives the opportunity to correct the error archive-wide. In the case of mpage, the lines "distributor grants the recipient permission for further" and "Permission to copy is granted so long as the PostScript code" are not found in any other package; good ! Cheers, Charles -- Charles Plessy Tsurumi, Kanagawa, Japan
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
2015-10-18 20:11 GMT-02:00 Ángel González : > > Kudos to Ben for noticing that old Changelog entry. > Yes, yes. Ben was really well. I will wait new opinions and I will open a serious bug. After this I will contact the upstream. I was afraid to open the bug without ask for opinions in debian-legal because the package is in Debian several years without problems. Thanks a lot to Riley, Ángel and Ben. Cheers, Eriberto
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
On 18/10/15 23:27, Eriberto wrote: Thanks Riley and Ángel! Ángel, The copyright notices in headers should be considered as priority over licenses inside generical files. So, the upstream intents provided by generical copyright files shouldn't be considered when packaging and if the files have headers. I understood your words, but the main license is non-DFSG (IMHO). Thanks a lot for your help! Regards, Eriberto Sure. I was considering that they probably *intended* it to be available under (L)GPL, and would thus be sympatetic to (properly) license under them. Not that Debian should solely rely on those files when there is more specific copyright information. Kudos to Ben for noticing that old Changelog entry.
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Eriberto Mota writes: > I am doing a revision over the orphaned package 'mpage' (in main tree). > > When migrating the debian/copyright file to 1.0 format, I did a full > revision in source code Thank you! This is important work to be done by the maintainer of any package in Debian. > The first issue is the license used by mpage: > > * Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim > * copies of this document as received, in any medium, provided > * that this copyright notice is preserved, and that the > * distributor grants the recipient permission for further > * redistribution as permitted by this notice. > > IMO, this license doesn't allow modify the source code. So, this > license is inadequate. Yes, the permission is restricted to only “verbatim copies”, which explicitly disallows modification. Lacking that permission means the work fails DFSG §3 and is non-free. > The second issue is the license of the Contrib/mfix/test.ps file: > > % Copyright (c) 1986-89, ArborText, Inc. > % Permission to copy is granted so long as the PostScript code > % is not resold or used in a commercial product. Yes, there is no clear permission to redistribute (“copy” does not mean “redistribute copies”), no permission to redistribute modified or derived works, and explicit denial of permission to use the work for commercial purposes. Those fail DFSG §1, §2, §3, and §6, making the work non-free. > In this case, the solution is remove the file (not essential, a > contrib only). That's a valid solution for this file. If the copyright holder could be contacted, it would be better to obtain an explicit written free license; but if in your assessment the file is not needed anyway, it is simpler to remove the file from the source package. > Well, I need your opinions about what to do. Should be this package > moved to non-free? Must it be removed? Am I wrong? The ‘CHANGES’ file contains an entry under “October 2002”: October 2002 - Released version 2.5.3 - Start moving mapge into the GPL... This at least suggests the upstream developer at the time of that entry intended to explicitly change the license of the whole work to GNU General Public License. You could contact the upstream copyright holder, cite that changelog entry, and request they follow the instructions in GNU GPL v3 to effectively grant license for every part of the work to all recipients. There needs to be an explicit written grant of license to the recipient, preferably in the work itself and not conflicting with any other notices (so those conflicting notices should be removed by the copyright holder who wrote them). -- \ “It's easy to play any musical instrument: all you have to do | `\ is touch the right key at the right time and the instrument | _o__)will play itself.” —Johann Sebastian Bach | Ben Finney
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Thanks Riley and Ángel! Ángel, The copyright notices in headers should be considered as priority over licenses inside generical files. So, the upstream intents provided by generical copyright files shouldn't be considered when packaging and if the files have headers. I understood your words, but the main license is non-DFSG (IMHO). Thanks a lot for your help! Regards, Eriberto 2015-10-18 19:06 GMT-02:00 Ángel González : > I have to agree with the interpretations of the given text. > > However, in addition to the license in the README file, it also comes with > COPYING > and COPYING.LESSER files with the text of GPL and LGPL, which seems to imply > they > wanted to allow distributing the program under (L)GPL. > Seems worth a clarification by the copyright owner, those may be old > copyright notices, > and they are probably willing to relicense. > > That may not be possible for Contrib/mfix/test.ps, but that file could be > stripped.
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
Thanks Riley and Ángel! Ángel, The copyright notices in headers should be considered as priority over licenses inside generical files. So, the upstream intents provided by generical copyright files shouldn't be considered when packaging and if the files have headers. I understood your words, but the main license is non-DFSG (IMHO). Thanks a lot for your help! Regards, Eriberto 2015-10-18 19:06 GMT-02:00 Ángel González : > I have to agree with the interpretations of the given text. > > However, in addition to the license in the README file, it also comes with > COPYING > and COPYING.LESSER files with the text of GPL and LGPL, which seems to imply > they > wanted to allow distributing the program under (L)GPL. > Seems worth a clarification by the copyright owner, those may be old > copyright notices, > and they are probably willing to relicense. > > That may not be possible for Contrib/mfix/test.ps, but that file could be > stripped. > > >
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
I have to agree with the interpretations of the given text. However, in addition to the license in the README file, it also comes with COPYING and COPYING.LESSER files with the text of GPL and LGPL, which seems to imply they wanted to allow distributing the program under (L)GPL. Seems worth a clarification by the copyright owner, those may be old copyright notices, and they are probably willing to relicense. That may not be possible for Contrib/mfix/test.ps, but that file could be stripped.
Re: Is mpage DFSG compatible?
On Sun, 18 Oct 2015 18:23:50 -0200 Eriberto Mota wrote: > Hi guys, > > I am doing a revision over the orphaned package 'mpage' (in main tree). > > When migrating the debian/copyright file to 1.0 format, I did a full > revision in source code and I found two doubtful situations for me. > > The first issue is the license used by mpage: > > * Permission is granted to anyone to make or distribute verbatim > * copies of this document as received, in any medium, provided > * that this copyright notice is preserved, and that the > * distributor grants the recipient permission for further > * redistribution as permitted by this notice. > > IMO, this license doesn't allow modify the source code. So, this > license is inadequate. > > The second issue is the license of the Contrib/mfix/test.ps file: > > % Copyright (c) 1986-89, ArborText, Inc. > % Permission to copy is granted so long as the PostScript code > % is not resold or used in a commercial product. > > In this license the rigths to resold or use in a commercial product is > denied. In this case, the solution is remove the file (not essential, > a contrib only). > > Well, I need your opinions about what to do. Should be this package > moved to non-free? Must it be removed? Am I wrong? I agree with both of your interpretations. pgpLMpNFbNvf8.pgp Description: PGP signature
