Re: copyright stanzas [was Re: Sys::SigAction]
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Hi Jonathan (and others),
On Thu, Feb 05, 2009 at 02:46:07PM -0500, Jonathan Yu wrote:
>What about having a line like: "This module is distributed under the
>same terms of Perl itself. Please see LICENSE for details."
>
>From what I have read in your email, does that mean you can't say (for
>purposes of Debian packaging) that License is Perl?
"Perl" is not a license.
When using same license as Perl itself, then for Debian packaging we
need to resolve what that means: GPL or Artistic License.
>What if it can be simply verified that the LICENSE file is simply the
>Perl license copied verbatim, too?
Still, the _file_ containing licensing information is not "a license",
so for Debian packaging we need to read the actual text and yes, if it
in fact is a duplicate of the licensing text contained with Perl itself,
then it contains the above mentioned 2 licenses and a small string of
text declaring that either of them is allowed.
>Also, are you saying that it would be harmful to include the LICENSE
>file, instead of simply pointing to the name of the LICENSE in the
>Copyright line?
No. I did not say so.
Stuffing in a file called "LICENSE" which contains some licensing info
does not tell which parts of the code (if anything) is licensed by those
conditions. So always write explicitly together with the copyright
information what licensing terms are allowed.
It is a good idea to also provide the actual licensing text, so that the
distributed tarball (or zipfile or whatever) is self-contained, instead
of assuming universal consensus on short forms of general licenses.
Hope that makes sense (and that I am right - I Am Not A Lawyer).
- Jonas
P.S.
Please do not cc others when you post to Debian mailinglists, unless
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- --
* Jonas Smedegaard - idealist og Internet-arkitekt
* Tlf.: +45 40843136 Website: http://dr.jones.dk/
[x] quote me freely [ ] ask before reusing [ ] keep private
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