Re: Bug#875876: RFS: python-dtcwt/0.12.0-1

[Ian Jackson <ijackson@chiark.greenend.org.uk>]

Ghislain Vaillant writes ("Re: Bug#875876: RFS: python-dtcwt/0.12.0-1"):
> FYI, here is the interpretation of the license by the upstream author. I 
> asked about it back when I did the initial release, and no issue was 
> raised by the FTP team.
> 
> https://github.com/rjw57/dtcwt/issues/109

Quoting that:

  All Python code and documentation in this repository is BSD 2-clause
  licensed. The wavelet co-efficient data is effectively in the public
  domain being as it is merely a mathematical "truth" that those are
  the wavelet co-efficients.

  The original implementation of the DTCWT includes this clause:
    [troublesome wording]

  Note that the original license uses the language "use the
  algorithms" which is unclear. The code in this repo implements the
  DT-CWT algorithm and if an algorithm is covered by copyright in a
  given juristiction, any use requires referencing the original
  author. If algorithms are not copyright-able then use does not. I
  have no control over this and I don't want to try to interpret the
  original license.

So I think that the situation is perfectly clear.  Algorithms are not
covered by copyright (anywhere).  The upstream author is just being
over-cautious in leaving in that notice.

I suggest that in the Debian package we c&p that comment from the
github page into the source package, and put that next to the upstream
caveat about the original clause - and then remove the caveat and the
troublesome notice from debian/copyright.

Ian.