Re: Bug#649674: [copyright-format] Proofreading of the examples.

[Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com>]

(-cc: the bug, since I am veering off topic)
Charles Plessy wrote:

> (In
> particular, the discussion in #649530 highlights that some of the examples are
> very artificial and turn quickly into cornercases in the real life, because the
> GPL and the MPL feature edited notices where the name of softwares or their
> holders are edited).

Let me comment on this, since I think my understanding is lacking.

Policy §4.5 says (and other sections repeat) that every package should
be accompanied by a verbatim copy of its copyright information and
distribution license.  Nobody seems to know what “verbatim” means, so
I’m going to ignore that for the moment.

In copyright-format, the license field in each Files paragraph
contains the full text of a license or a pointer to a license file
under /usr/share/common-licenses, or refers to a stand-alone License
paragraph for each license short name listed.  The spec also reminds
the reader to comply with distro policy and any relevant requirements
imposed by the license.

Now.  Unless the license itself has some relevant requirement on
distribution of binaries, nothing mentioned above (except maybe the
“verbatim”) requires the license headers from source files to be
reproduced.  It is the copyright information and the (verbatim)
license that actually matter.  Indeed, it is common practice to
reformat the copyright information, for example by combining notices
into a single list with one line per copyright holder.

So:

 - I don't think GPL-covered works featuring diverse notices is
   actually a problem.  If you preserve the notices in the source and
   accurately describe the copyright, license, and lack of warranty in
   the binary package, you're fine.

   And on the other hand, the need to reproduce BSD-style license
   texts verbatim means that their diversity is a real problem (and a
   well known one, I think).

   Is this wrong?

 - Policy could be clearer about “verbatim”.  Proposal: change
   “verbatim copy of its copyright information and distribution
   license” → “copyright information and a verbatim copy of its
   distribution license”.  What do you think? :)  Worth a bug?

Thanks,
Jonathan