Re: Gnus Manual License
Hubert Chan <hubert@uhoreg.ca> writes:
> On Fri, 06 Oct 2006 12:24:30 +0200, Simon Josefsson <jas@extundo.com> said:
>
>> Hubert Chan <hubert@uhoreg.ca> writes:
>>>> * 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this *
>>>> software must display the following acknowledgment:
>>>
>>> This does not place any conditions on the distribution or
>>> modification of the work itself. It only places conditions on
>>> auxiliary material.
>
>> No, the license demands that the clause 3 part of the license is
>> preserved together with the work itself:
>
>> * 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
>> * notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
>
> The GFDL also requires a copyright notice that lists the cover
> texts.
Of course it does. The cover texts _as_ _cover_ _texts_ are present
only when there actually is a cover. Which is not the case in the
Texinfo source. So the cover texts have to be specified in some
strictly recognizable location that will get read when the license
conditions are perused. The license itself is unmodifiable. The
remaining place is the the copyright notice.
> Requiring the copyright notice is generally considered a necessary
> part of ensuring that the software remains free.
>
> [...]
>
>> I would count the book cover under auxiliary material -- the cover
>> is typically not part of the texinfo manual.
>
> Unless you routinely rip off the covers from your books, I would
> consider the cover to be part of the documentation, if it's in
> printed form.
But it usually isn't in printed form, and the whole point of
prescribing cover texts is to be able to ensure a certain form of the
opaque copy (print) from the transparent copy (Texinfo source).
There are no covers in the Texinfo source.
> My point, though, is that I believe that the differences between the
> restrictions in the OpenSSL license and the GFDL license are
> sufficient such that one cannot say that "If OpenSSL is allowed, the
> GFDL documentation should be allowed as well."
Straw man: "the GFDL documentation should be allowed as well" was not
the point of discussion. It rather was "GFDL documentation with the
minimum front and back cover texts prescribed by the current GNU
maintainer guidelines and no other explicitly invariant material
should be allowed as well".
Even Stallman concedes that there are possible combinations of
invariant material that would render documentation essentially unfree.
> It does introduce an interesting point of comparison, but beyond
> that, it should not force us to decide on the GFDL in a specific
> manner.
Actually, on GFDLed documentation in a _general_ manner.
--
David Kastrup, Kriemhildstr. 15, 44793 Bochum
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