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Re: debian/copyright and Files-Within-Files



On Mon, Jun 29, 2009 at 11:55:29AM -0400, Jonathan Yu wrote:
> For example, if an upstream module contains a Stuff.tar.gz, and that
> file itself contains stuff that is all under the same license, but has
> different copyright information.

> Assume Stuff.tar.gz contains files:
>  foo.c
>  bar.txt
>  baz.c

> And foo.c is: Copyright 2005 Some Company A
> bar.txt is Copyright 2002 Some Person B
> baz.c is Copyright 2002-2007 Other Fictional Entity

> How would we represent such a case? Would we need to unpack that
> tarball and then reference the files appropriately?

Unpacking the tarballs would mean modifying the pristine upstream tar,
wouldn't it?  I don't think we want to do that.

Is it not sufficient to just list

  Files: Stuff.tar.gz
  Copyright: 2005 Some Company A
             2002 Some Person B
             2002-2007 Other Fictional Entity
  License: Tar Public License

?

I think the logical unit to describe here (to the extent that we even want
more detail than "the work as a whole") is the file in the source package,
even if that file is a tarball, so I would suggest using the above.

> I have come across this case in Module::CPANTS::Analyse, which is a
> Perl module that looks inside .tar.gz files without extracting them
> out. It includes several such tarballs as a way to test the module
> functionality.

And these tarballs contain files with differing copyright holders?  Congrats
on finding a strange corner case. :)

-- 
Steve Langasek                   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer                   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer                                    http://www.debian.org/
slangasek@ubuntu.com                                     vorlon@debian.org


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