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Re: DEP-5: additional requirements to use with upstream



On Fri, Aug 13, 2010 at 05:45:21PM +1200, Lars Wirzenius wrote:
> On to, 2010-08-12 at 22:28 -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:
> > Lars Wirzenius <liw@liw.fi> writes:
> > > On to, 2010-08-12 at 17:14 -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:

> > >> * An additional section with the same syntax as the Files section but with
> > >>   no Files field that would be used for documenting the copyright of the
> > >>   distribution as a whole.  (In US law, this is called a compilation
> > >>   copyright.)  This is not the same thing as a Files: * section, which
> > >>   would specify a default copyright and license for any individual file
> > >>   that doesn't have other information.  In some edge cases, the
> > >>   compilation copyright and license can be different than the copyright
> > >>   and license of any individual file in the distribution.

> > > I am uncomfortable signalling compilation copyright just with the
> > > absence of a Files: field. It seems to error prone to me. It would be
> > > better to be explicit, I think. What would be a good way of being
> > > explicit in this case?

> > Maybe allow Copyright and License fields in the header?  This would also
> > has the advantage of being the way, in DEP-5, to do what several people
> > are asking for and just state the license for the whole package without
> > enumerating files, equivalent to what they're doing without DEP-5 now.
> > (This differs from a Files: * block in that the latter makes specific
> > claims about individual files, whereas the general copyright and license
> > statement does not and has the same granularity as most upstream license
> > declarations.)

> This sounds good to me. Does anyone object?

That seems sensible to me.  I think it will require some significant
restructuring of the text, to declare the License and Copyright fields in
advance of references to them in the discussion of the header stanza, so
maybe we should postpone the implementation of this change until we've
cleared a few of the other issues?

-- 
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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