Re: r-cran-maptools_0.7.16-1_i386.changes REJECTED (fwd)
Hi Mark (and other ftpmasters),
I agree to some extend with Roger. Could you comment on this?
Would you think that the package is fit for non-free if you are
non convinced?
Kind regards
Andreas.
[Full quote to debian-science list]
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Wed, 11 Mar 2009 09:33:41 +0100 (CET)
From: Roger Bivand <Roger.Bivand@nhh.no>
To: Andreas Tille <tillea@rki.de>
Cc: Mark Hymers <ftpmaster@debian.org>, Julia Koschinsky <jkoschin@asu.edu>
Subject: Re: r-cran-maptools_0.7.16-1_i386.changes REJECTED (fwd)
On Tue, 10 Mar 2009, Andreas Tille wrote:
On Tue, 10 Mar 2009, Roger Bivand wrote:
The link in maptools/inst/LICENSE is outdated, and has been replaced by:
http://geodacenter.asu.edu/sdata
on CVS.
Thanks.
The data sets are used in the function examples, and cannot be removed from
the package.
Well, if it is concerning *examples* for the use of the code why do
you think they cannot be removed? m Well, examples are important to
learn about the usage of code - but finally they are not really needed
or do I miss something?
Yes, you miss the main point of examples in R packages. They serve two
functions, one to demonstrate the working of the function on real data (here
data sets used most often in the scientific literature), for import functions
these must be real external files, not saved R objects. Secondly and most
crucially, R CMD check <pkg> is the key QA tool for packages, and runs all the
examples in a package. Any failure in these shows that an edit had unexpected
side effects. I often work on packages offline, so the package must ship with
the real files.
I cannot see any reason to relicense them, since they are data, not code.
You'll have to ask Mark to substantiate why anyone might want to have
"modification or distribution rights".
Well, that's because of the Debian Social Contract[1]. Ftpmaster just
makes sure that any package is compliant to this and maptools in the
form it is currently provided is not. This is true as well for data
as well as it is for documentation etc.
I'm sorry, but I do not sympathise with Mark's position on this. Code and
documentation yes, but data no. As noted below, the document you refer to is
about code and documentation, not data. How on earth are we to secure
reproducible research if people distribute modified versions of central data
sets? See the R mlbench package for a similar situation. To comply, I would
have to divide the data files from the package itself, and have maptools
Suggest: its own data file package, right? I have no reason to do this, it is
unnecessary work, and would be very confusing for users trying to run the
examples but getting "file not found".
They are for demonstration purposes only, and at least two (sids and
columbus) are very widely used for teaching etc., and used as such by other
packages too.
But there are also two data sets with free license (fylk-val and
pointZ) right? Perhaps I'll ask the authors of the restricted licenses
data whether they might consider changing their license. It might be
that the author just not thought about this long enough and nobody
asked them about a free license.
You can ask the admin at ASU, but I guess that their description is like CC BY
ND, and I don't think you'll get any more there (CC'ed, attached first email
from Andreas with copy of Mark's rejection for Julia's information- I guess CC
BY SA is Mark's minimum requirement?).
The package is intended to provide a collection of tools for handling maps,
so it does need to ship with example files. I personally do not see the need
for a Debian binary (or any binary for platforms where users can install
from source) of any contributed package, so I'm not sympathetic to Mark's
attitude.
Well, the reason for a package is simple: Our users would like to say:
Please install my computer ready to run for epidemiological research.
Then let them use another OS and distribution if Debian can't manage for
reasons of its own choosing. This all works for Task Views, and indeed your
time and effort would be much better spent on contributing an Epidemiology Task
View to CRAN. Then any user on any platform could do this automatically, right?
This is done via a so called metapackage which you can select with
one click or install automatically in large scale installations
using automatex install and upgrade mechanisms.
They do Task View installs to images and propagate those.
There should be
no need for users to install their R packages including dependencies
themselves - so at least from a Debian Med point of view it is
evident that we need to package all preconditions for CRAN
surveillance and considering this final target: we are not
directly using Maptools - it is used by CRAN Surveillance and
for this specific purpose the examples might be not needed (perhaps,
just correct me if I'm wrong).
Wrong. Running the examples, and especially examples using the sids (North
Carolina sudden infant death syndrome) data set may be crucial to understanding
how to use their own external data, also for epidemiologists. Contributed
packages are both software and domain knowledge, and examples are crucial to
learning.
For sure there will be users who
are not working in epidemiology why just want to use plain Maptools
and these will be not happy aboit missing examples ...
A very bad alternative would be to have to download and unzip the shapefiles
for every use of the examples, but I'm not in a mood to make any changes
other than updating the link.
Well, I neither able nor do I intend to force you to change anything
which is perfectly fine from your point of view (and I can really
understand that my request is basically void for you). So I try
to find a reasonable solution for my purpose and will keep you informed
if you like.
I've CCed Julia at ASU, but their conditions for (many) data sets made
available by (many) researchers are unchanged over many years.
Kind regards
Andreas.
[1] http://www.debian.org/social_contract
Note that nothing in this very short document discusses this case. I am very
sure that the same situation affects the vast majority of R contributed
packages that include data sets (especially external file format examples), but
here zealot Mark has put his foot down only because I was careful to actually
bother to write a LICENSE file. In most other cases, things slip by unnoticed.
With regard to code and documentation, I have no objections, but I do have
objections wrt. key example data sets, which do not need to be licensed in the
same way. I think Mark should simply back down, this is a waste of time.
Best wishes,
Roger
[2] http://debian-med.alioth.debian.org/tasks/epi.html
--
Roger Bivand
Economic Geography Section, Department of Economics, Norwegian School of
Economics and Business Administration, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen,
Norway. voice: +47 55 95 93 55; fax +47 55 95 95 43
e-mail: Roger.Bivand@nhh.no
From tillea@rki.de Tue Mar 10 15:00:57 2009
Date: Tue, 10 Mar 2009 15:00:37 +0100 (CET)
From: Andreas Tille <tillea@rki.de>
To: Roger Bivand <Roger.Bivand@nhh.no>
Cc: debian-science@lists.debian.org, 515646@bugs.debian.org
Subject: r-cran-maptools_0.7.16-1_i386.changes REJECTED (fwd)
Hi Roger,
at first I would like to inform you that I plan to package R CRAN Maptools
for the Debian GNU Linux distribution. It is a precondition for CRAN
Surveillance which should be part of the epidemiology task of Debian Med [1].
I actually prepared a package which worked so far but there is a licensing
issue which is not accepted by ftpmaster. Please read below about the
problematic files.
I noticed that the download page is not available any more so you should
probably at least fix the license statement in your downloadable tarball.
Do you see any chance for relicensing the problematic files? Would
Maptools miss any essential features if the problematic data files would
be removed from the tarball?
Kind regards and thanks for providing R Maptools
Andreas.
[1] http://debian-med.alioth.debian.org/tasks/epi.html
--
http://fam-tille.de
---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 07 Mar 2009 19:46:28 +0000
From: Mark Hymers <ftpmaster@debian.org>
To: Andreas Tille <tille@debian.org>,
Cc: Debian Installer <installer@ftp-master.debian.org>
Subject: r-cran-maptools_0.7.16-1_i386.changes REJECTED
Dear Maintainer,
Rejected:
"""Files: inst/shapes/baltim.*, inst/shapes/columbus.*, and inst/shapes/sids.*
are derived by permission from SAL data files
prepared by Luc Anselin; they were downloaded from:
http://sal.agecon.uiuc.edu/stuff/data.html
under the following conditions: "The data are provided as is, without
any warranties. Please make sure to give proper credit when using
them in any publications. Some of the data sets are purely illustrative
and should not be used for substantive research."
"""
This does not give us modification or distribution rights. Please remove
these datasets or get them relicensed.
Thanks,
Mark
===
If you don't understand why your files were rejected, or if the
override file requires editing, reply to this email.
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