Re: [opal@debian.org: Re: Accepted mmake 2.2.1-4 (all source)]
Thomas Bushnell wrote:
> In the old version, he did so in the file LICENSE, but that is
> technically not enough--you must do so in such a way that identifies
> *which files* are being licensed. The normal way is to put the
> license statement in every file; but he could also list the files in
> LICENSE, or by some other way. He did not, and that's a bug.
FYI, another way includes:
"All files distributed as part of this tarball", or "This entire program".
That can occasionally be implied -- but that only works if it's actually
true, and so subsequent packagers who add files have to be very careful.
This method is discouraged for those reasons. See below about hsftp.
Mmake's old license statement is a muddled mess. It *should have said*
something approximately like this:
---
Mmake -- program to generate a Makefile for Java source files
Copyright 1998-2001 Jan-Henrik Haukeland <hauk@tildeslash.com>
Mmake may be distributed and/or modified under the terms of the GNU General
Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, version 2.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
---
Not that hard, is it? Why do people have so much trouble with this?
Ola Lundqvist wrote:
> Here is some samples:
> hsftp - note in readme but no licensing source comments
The note in the readme would seem to imply that the license covers the entire
program. This is basically OK except for the following problems:
* The debian/copyright file should include the *entire* set of copyright
notices in the readme -- this includes the one for command.c).
* The debian/ specific parts don't have any license. (Brian Russo screwed
up.)
> kernel-patch-ctx - no notes at all, but they are kernel patches
> and upstream release them (or did at least) just as patches.
Not good.
I looked a little further, and the kernel packages suffer from a similar
problem. Large numbers of files in the kernel are missing the key statement
"This software may be distributed and/or modified under the terms of the GNU
General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, version
2," and don't have anything similar And there's no such general statement in
the COPYING file. (There certainly should be.)
Since the GPL only "applies to any program or other work which contains
a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed
under the terms of this General Public License," this sort of statement is
really necessary to properly place something under the GPL. :-P
> lshw - just a COPYING file
> cron-apt - just a COPYING file (this should be ok as I'm the author)
* Add copyright notices to each of the files. If you're the sole author,
these will say "Copyright (years) Ola Lundqvist", where (years) are
(basically) any years you released a version with new material in it.
If there are other authors (submitters of large, significant patches, for
instance), they get copyright notices for the years they wrote their parts.
* Add a notice to each file saying the following (or something similar; if you
want your program to be version-2-only, you know what to do):
This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.
This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.
You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA
* In other words, follow the instructions in the GPL on "How to Apply These
Terms to Your New Program"!
* You don't need to bother with files which are too trivial and unoriginal to
be copyrighted. (I'd guess src/cron.d and src/logrotate qualify.)
> setserial - just as a small note in version.h and linux/serial.h no
> GPL document in upstream sources at all.
Also no copyright notices on most of the files. Yuck.
This is no good at all; there's no explicit permissions granted (except for
those two files), and under copyright law that means no permissions.
----
These are all distributability bugs, disgustingly.
We *need* a new FAQ:
"What do I have to do to make sure the software I wrote is actually licensed
under the XYZ license?"
It's frightening how many people have messed this one up, especially
considering that the GPL even *tells* you what you have to do. :-(
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