Re: License audit on dpkg source tree

[Raphael Hertzog <hertzog@debian.org>]

Hi,

On Thu, 12 Nov 2009, Guillem Jover wrote:
> Hi!
> 
> This is something that has been bothering me for a long time, so the
> other day I sat down and did a full license audit of the sources.
> 
> I've cleaned up the license headers and added missing ones, as a side
> effect “licensecheck -r dpkg” works better now. There's still lots of
> copyright statements missing, I have a patch around to add few, but
> every file takes time digging, and there's probably more urgent things
> to tend to. I'd like to get all GPL code unified as GPL-2+,
> eventually, though.
> 
> The remaining issues, which might need asking people around are:
> 
> * dselect/methods/multicd/*: GPL-2 only
> 
>   The dselect-multicd method from the dpkg-multicd package, states on
>   its debian/copyright to be based on builtin methods from dselect,
>   but then has a license of GPL-2 only, while dselect has GPL-2+.
> 
> * dselect/methods/Debian/Dselect/Ftp.pm: No header
>   dselect/methods/ftp/*: GPL (no version)
> 
>   The dselect-ftp method from the dpkg-ftp package, states on its
>   debian/copyright file to be under the GPL-2 only. Ideally this
>   would have the same terms as the rest of the code base, in case
>   code needs to be reused for example.

I'm ccing all the people listed in the copyright. Please respond and
tell us whether you agree to change the license of your code to "GPLv2 or
later" instead of the "GPLv2 only"?

I'm expecting some bounces, most likely that the email of Andy Guy and
Heiko Schlitterman are not valid anymore. I found an alternative email for
Heiko but no clear trace of Andy Guy (the name is quite common
unfortunately). Does anyone know how to contact him?

As far I am concerned, I agree with changing the license of all my code to
GPLv2 or later.

Cheers,
-- 
Raphaël Hertzog

Like what I do? Sponsor me: http://ouaza.com/wp/2010/01/05/5-years-of-freexian/
My Debian goals: http://ouaza.com/wp/2010/01/09/debian-related-goals-for-2010/