Re: REVISED PROPOSAL regarding DFSG 3 and 4, licenses, and modifiable text
Branden Robinson <branden@debian.org> writes:
> On Sat, Dec 01, 2001 at 07:05:10PM -0800, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
> > I thought there was general agreement that a proportional limit was
> > better than a simple number.
>
> Maybe this is how you feel, but I so far haven't seen general agreement
> on anything. Especially now that Anthony Towns has spoken up and
> characterized the entire proposal as a waste of time.
My opinion has been from the beginning that it's a waste of time. If
you want a "waste of time" vote, well....
But, I'm willing to see that it's important to you, and spend time on
it to make it as good as I can, even though I'd rather we simply
didn't worry about it at all.
> > One disadvantage to a simple per-package limit is that you can defeat
> > it by splitting something up into more packages.
>
> That would be difficult under the GNU FDL, where you are required to
> reproduce all Invariant Sections with any proportion, great or small, of
> the licensed work.
You've misunderstood my point.
"So, I can't just put my pet novella in a package as Invariant Text
because it goes over the 24k limit? No problem; I'll put 20K in each
of a bunch of packages."
If you really are worried about the "pet novella" problem, then a
proportional test is much better.
> It doesn't to me. I don't find a megabyte of invariant text acceptable,
> whether the total work is 1, 2, 3, 4, 10, or even 20 megabytes. Beyond
> that we're getting into highly unusual territory for Debian packages in
> general.
But you do find it acceptable if it's split up in a bunch of separate
packages?
> > Also, I think it should be a condition of any proposal that it
> > recognizes the presumptive validity of our past practice--or, it
> > explicitly say "this proposal is intended to refer to new software,
> > not to things already in the archive".
>
> That is not the intent of my proposal.
But then say: "My goal is going to include the exclusion of the
following GNU packages". Come right out and say it--and then see if
people are willing to go along!
Now, you earlier said that you didn't intend the rigid limit to be so
rigid that we couldn't override it in particular cases. So, can we
agree to override it in the particular cases of things already part of
Debian? If that's only the Emacs manual, then it should be an easy
thing, and we can move on, right?
Or, is the limit rigid when you apply it, but loose and flexible when
you argue for it? That seems deceptive to me; I hope it's not what
you meant when you said that you were not against flexible
application.
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