Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL
On Fri, 25 Apr 2003, Glenn Maynard wrote:
> > To roast a hoary chestnut, I've not yet seen a good argument why we'd
> > want the RFCs to be relicensed as DFSG-free, apart from the "so it can
> > go into Debian main". Modifying an RFC and re-releasing it is not a
> > good thing, but the DFSG says it is
>
> I suppose this is opportunity to say that this begs the question. :)
>
> Being able to modify an RFC and re-release it is absolutely a good thing.
> Why should I have to start from scratch when writing a new spec that
> resembles an older one? Why shouldn't I be able to reuse parts of other
> RFCs?
RFC authors do it all the time, by issuing updates to existing RFC
documents. They say "Do it like this, except for this, this, and this".
Since software is not written in English, we can't exactly use the same
methodology as an RFC to write new versions of our software (unless we take
this to be the human language equivalent of a patch). Hmm, that suggests
that all documentation which can be redistributed is DFSG free... <grin>
--
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Matthew Palmer, Geek In Residence
http://ieee.uow.edu.au/~mjp16
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