Source packages generating non-free and free binary packages (was: Re: [Debian Installer <maor-installer@debian.org>] Reminder: imagemagick_4.2.9-1_i386.changes was rejected)

[Philippe Troin <phil@fifi.org>]

Brian Almeida <bma@debian.org> writes:

> On Tue, Oct 26, 1999 at 12:39:54PM -0700, Philippe Troin wrote:
> > Brian Almeida <brian@cicat.com> writes:
> > 
> > > On Tue, Oct 26, 1999 at 02:35:57AM -0700, Philippe Troin wrote:
> > > > And how do I get it set up to ?
> > > Split the non-free stuff out of the main source package, and make a new
> > > non-free source package from the original tarball - look at mysql for an
> > > example of how this is done.
> > 
> > This will be a ridiculous source duplication won't it ?
> >
> Either put the whole thing in non-free, or duplicate the source. Your choice.
> non-free source cannot go into main. Period.

"Period" is quite a powerful and convincing argument I must say :-)

Let me explain a little bit more.

Imagemagick comes with a compilation switch which enables LZW
compression and decompression. When compiling with LZW, the generated
packages are "non-free" since they content patented algorithms. When
compiling without LZW support, the generated packages are free.

Now the problem is "where do the source belong ?".

 1) I duplicate the exact same sources in main and non-free (which was
    what the previous maintainer was doing).

 2) The source packages go to main, and generates packages for main
    and non-free (that's what I was trying to do, but dinstall didn't
    like it).

 3) Any other suggestion ?

And are the sources considered free or not ?

Phil.