sgran@debian.org wrote:
apt-cache policy `dpkg -S /path/to/file | awk -F: '{print $1}'` will tell you where the file came from, and whether it's free, if it'spart of a deb.
It will?I don't see the licenses for the files in /usr/share/common-licenses listed, nor the licenses for the /usr/share/doc/*/copyright files.
Anyway, you mean I have to carefully read through and examine with a fine-tooth comb the text of the license for every single file in order to determine whether it's free? Isn't that a service Debian claimed it would provide for me?
Anyway, there are *still* packages which fail to list the licenses for some of their files (beyond even /usr/share/doc/*/copyright) in /usr/share/doc/*/copyright. Emacs21 is the classic example; but since its maintainers clearly don't give a damn about the Social Contract *or* Policy, I guess it's a poor example.
So, just to be clear, you are arguing that what you care about is putting non-free software that Debian distributes into a special place on the filesystem? The point of which is what exactly?
Being able to tell the difference without extensive work. :-P