Re: Bug#346354: AW: Bug#346354: Is distribution of the maxdb-doc package a GPL violation?

[Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>]

Steve Langasek <vorlon@debian.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 27, 2006 at 05:35:51AM -0700, Walter Landry wrote:
> > debian@martin-kittel.de wrote:
> > > I have verfified that the actual sources for the generated HTML are
> > > Microsoft Word documents and that those will not be
> > > distributed. Does the mean that the maxdb-doc package will have to
> > > be pulled from the repository?
> 
> > Yes, unless you get a license exemption from the copyright holder
> > allowing Debian and its mirrors to distribute the HTML as is.  They
> > will probably agree.  In that case, it goes into non-free.
> 
> It's not obvious to me that either the license exemption or the non-free
> categorization are necessary here.  GPL requires the "preferred form for
> modification", which for most people working on derivative works would
> probably *not* be the Word docs?

The people actually doing modifications use the Word format, not the
HTML format.  It seems clear to me that the Word format is
"preferred".

Cheers,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu