Re: why is 'dbf' in non-free?

[Adrian Bunk <bunk@fs.tum.de>]

On Mon, 7 Jan 2002, DvB wrote:

> I ran a search for dbf (xbase) packages in debian and came up with the
> 'dbf' package which is in non-free.
> If it's in non-free because of licensing issues with the Xbase format,
>...

If you lok at the copyright notice (debian/copyright in the source or
/usr/share/doc/dbf/copyright if you have installed the dbf package) it
seems that the problem isn't the Xbase (there are other free programs like
e.g. Gnumeric that support this format) but the non-free licence of
libdbf (but this doesn't affect you when writing your own dbf library):

<--  snip  -->

Copyright:

        DBF - xbase manipulation package
        Copyright (c) Brad Eacker, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1994

        Permission is granted to distribute and use the source,
        documentation files and/or compiled binaries associated with dbf
        for non-commercial use. No charges may be made for such
        distributions.
...

<--  snip  -->

> TIA

cu
Adrian