Re: LaTeX & DFSG

[Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>]

Jeff Licquia <licquia@debian.org> wrote:
> On Sun, 2002-07-21 at 17:24, William F Hammond wrote:
> > Jeff Licquia <licquia@debian.org> writes:
> > 
> > > Let's imagine something like LaTeX licensed under something like the
> > > LPPL, and let's also assume that I'm going to hack it.
> > >
> > > So, I edit "article.sty".  OK, no problem; just rename it to
> > > "article-hacked.sty".
> > 
> > (You mean, I think, for LaTeX2E that you want to hack article.cls,
> > which is the LaTeX "article" class.)
> > 
> > I'm dubious about the sanity of bring up here a dependence of "book"
> > on "article", and, in any event what I describe next is probably not
> > what I would actually do, but, granted your scenario, TDS and Kpathsea
> > become relevant.
> 
> Right.  I imagine my usage of file names regarding LaTeX is causing
> shudders to creep up lots of spines.  Even should the need arise, I'm
> sure I would be the last person you'd want hacking on LaTeX. :-)

But what if latex evolved to the point where there is a cascade of
dependencies?  Is Debian going to have to monitor what the LaTeX
people do, just to make sure that they don't make it too hard to
modify?  What if a third party modifies LaTeX and puts his work under
the LPPL.  Is Debian going to have to vet that person's work to make
sure that it isn't too hard to modify?

The following quote about the FSF's judgement of the LPPL is
instructive:

Mark Wielaard <mark@klomp.org> wrote:
> They seem to tolerate the filename changing requirement in the special
> case of Latex since it is so easy to circumvent. I believe not everybody
> on this list is yet convinced of that though.

I don't think that Debian should be making a special exemption for the
LaTeX project.

Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu


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