Re: Shouldn't /usr/doc/*/copyright actually contain copyright information?

[Dale Scheetz <dwarf@polaris.net>]

On 16 Oct 1999, Ben Pfaff wrote:

> David Starner <dvdeug@x8b4e53cd.dhcp.okstate.edu> writes:
> 
> > Shouldn't /usr/share/doc/<package>/copyright actually contain 
> > copyright information? Because quite a few of them don't.
> 
> Yes:
> 
> 6.5. Copyright information
> --------------------------
> 
>      Every package must be accompanied by a verbatim copy of its
>      copyright and distribution license in the file
>      /usr/share/doc/<package-name>/copyright. This file must neither
>      be compressed nor be a symbolic link.
> 
While this may be what Policy says, actual practice is somewhat different
for those packages under either the GPL, LGPL, Artistic, and BSD licenses.
These packages mearly reference the actual copy of the license in
/usr/doc/copyright. (bit of a misnomer, as these are all licenses ;-)
Under these circumstances, the copyright file in /usr/doc/<package> is
usually a simple statement about who holds the copyright, and where the
applicable license can be found (/usr/doc/copyright). There _sould_ be a
notice in the package's "copyright" file to indicate the actual copyright
holder, as well as the license.

HTH,

Dwarf
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