Re: Bug#158529: vcg does not have a usable license

[Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>]

Malcolm Parsons <malcolm@ivywell.screaming.net> wrote:
> The code can be de-uglified with a combination of this perl script, and
> indent(1L):
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------
> #!/usr/bin/perl
> $text="";
> while(<>){ $text.=$_; }
> $text =~ s/\/\*[^\*]*;[^\*]*\*\///sg;
> $text =~ s/\/\*[^\/]*;[^\/]*\*\///sg;
> print $text
> ---------------------------------------------------
> 
> Would I be able to fulfill the requirements of the GNU GPL by modifying
> the files like this?

Did the uglification process not remove the comments and change all of
the variable and function names?  This script wouldn't seem to recover
those things.  The real question is, does this put it in the
**preferred** form for modification.  If you can understand the
resulting code enough to make modifications, then that is probably
good enough.

> Should this be done in the debian diff, or a new orig.tar.gz?

You would have to make a new orig.tar.gz.  Debian is not allowed to
distribute the "original" sources at all, since they aren't in the
preferred form for modification.

Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu