GPLv3 x lintian
Dear Sirs:
I recently developed a package named ChironFS which I started distributing only the
source as tar.gz. The last version I published was the first with binary packages, both
RPM and DEB. But the DEB packages was obtained using alien to convert from the
RPM packages. Tonight I will publish a new release, the first with DEB packages made
with "dpkg-deb --build" and checked with lintian.
The problem is that my package is GPLv3 licensed and lintian threw the error message
copyright-should-refer-to-common-license-file-for-gpl and in my Ubuntu Feisty Fawn box
I found no GPLv3 license in the common license directory. So if I refer to that directory,
I will change my package license to GPLv2. In the other hand, if I do not refer to this
directory, lintian tells me that my DEB package is not ok with the debian policies.
I finally solved the problem inserting the following text at the start of my copyright file:
"This is the ChironFS Replication Filesystem package written by
Luis Otavio de Colla Furquim <luisfurquim@gmail.com>. On Debian
GNU/Linux systems, the complete text of the GNU General Public
License version 2 can be found in `/usr/share/common-licenses/GPL'.
But this package is licensed under GPLv3 which does not exist in my
/usr/share/common-licenses directory so both I do not have anything
to reference there and I must keep this license file in the package
doc directory. But as the lintian debian package checker throws the
copyright-should-refer-to-common-license-file-for-gpl error when I
check the debian package I had to make the reference to this directory
inside this copyright anyway, just to satisfy its policies checks."
Now lintian shows no message when checking my DEB packages and
ChironFS remains licensed under GPLv3. But I thought that either lintian
should check which version of the GPL the package is licensed or the
distribution could add the GPLv3 text to the common licenses directory.
Thank you for your attention
--
Luis Otávio de Colla Furquim
Don't feed the tribbles
http://www.furquim.org/chironfs
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