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Re: Releasing software sponsored by an employer



On Fri, 4 Nov 2005 00:13:34 -0500 Nathanael Nerode wrote:

[...]
>     <one line to give the program's name and a brief idea of what it
>     does.>
>     <program name> Copyright <year>  <copyright holder>
> 
>     <program name> is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
>     modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as
>     published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the
>     License, or (at your option) any later version.
> 
>     <program name> is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
>     but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
>     MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
>     GNU General Public License for more details.
> 
>     You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
>     along with <program name>; if not, write to the Free Software
>     Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin St, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 
>     02110-1301 USA

I agree on everything you said, with the following comments/questions:

* why do you suggest repeating <program name> everywhere? I think it
makes adapting the notice to different pieces of software less easy (a
differently named GPL'd work can be derived from a previously existing
GPL'd work, you know): I would say

  This work is free software; [...]
  This work is distributed [...]
  [...] along with this work [...]

* why do you put <program name> on the same line as the copyright notice
(and even repeat it when more than one copyright holder exists)?
Isn't

  <work name> - <one line to a brief idea of what the work is>
  Copyright (C) <year>  <copyright holder>

better?



-- 
    :-(   This Universe is buggy! Where's the Creator's BTS?   ;-)
......................................................................
  Francesco Poli                             GnuPG Key ID = DD6DFCF4
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