On Thu, Sep 04, 2003 at 02:57:09PM +0200, Sven Luther wrote: > Is it enough to write on the CD pocket or something such instruction on > getting the sources from any debian mirror, or something such, and > say that the modified sources are on CD #2 or something such. You either need to supply a written offer valid for three years, OR provide the user with the opportunity to collect a complete and correct corresponding source ISO at the time he receives the binary one. The user can *decline* the offer of a source ISO, and your obligations under the GPL will be met, as I understand them. I would *not* provide instructions for using a Debian mirror unless the stuff on the binary ISO really is unmodified. I think it's safer to just produce a complete, comprehensive, and correct source ISO image. If your CD preparation technology makes that difficult, I suggest correcting that flaw at once. > What about distributing the iso of such a CD ? Would a COPYING file or > something such which explains the above be ok ? Or do the source need to > be included on the same ftp server ? I'd make both source and binary ISOs available from the same location. Again, as I understand it, it's the user's choice to decline at that time, and your obligation to provide him or her with source is immediately discharged one way or the other. In many cases users will decline the offer of source, so it's not like you need to burn one source ISO for every binary ISO. Some small ratio of source to binary, though I'm not sure how small, will suffice. If you run out, alternative measures include having a working system with a CD burner at the point of distribution (Debian did this at their booth at LWCE-SF 2002) so that source ISOs could be produced on demand if you run out. Alternatively you can collect a nominal fee and the person's name and address, and mail the source ISO to them later. In my opinion the written three-year offer is really not worth the trouble for private individuals or low-resource organizations. It's not worth the risk of giving people a cause of legal action if 2 years and 360 days later some guy crawls out of the woodwork and you can't even clearly remember what he got from you. My advice in summary: use good Debian CD creation technology to create your binary AND source ISO images, burn maybe 1 source ISO for every 10 binary ISOs at only a modest increase to your costs, and rest easy without any three-year obligations. -- G. Branden Robinson | People are equally horrified at Debian GNU/Linux | hearing the Christian religion branden@debian.org | doubted, and at seeing it http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | practiced. -- Samuel Butler
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