Re: Request for help with GNU GSL package re-org
On Mon, Aug 25, 2008 at 9:50 AM, Thomas Weber
<thomas.weber.mail@gmail.com> wrote:
> Am Sonntag, den 24.08.2008, 21:21 +0200 schrieb Ondrej Certik:
>> Hi Dirk!
>> Indeed, this is very unfortunate. Another example of this is the
>> Czech-English dictionary:
>>
>> http://packages.debian.org/en/sid/stardict-english-czech
>>
>> which the author assembled by inviting people over the net to help him
>> put the words in over the web interface so that we have a truly "free"
>> czech english dictionary, but he also use GFDL for it, so it ended up
>> in Debian non-free.
>
> I think you didn't you look at the precise license terms, as in
> stardict-english-czech-20080701/README.
Indeed. But the README says it is actually GFDL without invariant sections:
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document
under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.1
or any later version published by the Free Software Foundation;
with no Invariant Sections, with the
Front-Cover Texts being "Založeno na projektu GNU/FDL Anglicko-Český
slovník, http://slovnik.zcu.cz";,
and with the Back-Cover Texts "Autoři:
[200 lines follows]
Is it still non-free? (the requirement of back-cover just plain sucks)
>
> Can anybody please explain how to publish a book with a license that
> requires almost 200(!) lines of back cover text, including enlightening
> author names like "ghost", "lJxSusrjgXkqxFudwV" and "h0das"?
>
> Frankly, this is a perfect example of why invariant sections are a
> problem in real life. This thing will never be published as a book.
>
> Then again, this usage of the license raises another interesting
> question:
> If I take this dictionary and add new translations, surely my name
> should appear in the back cover text as well, shouldn't it? Well, the
> license doesn't allow this!
Yes, it just plain sucks. I myself really like that Debian is so
strict and requires even the orig tarball in main to be DFSG free.
I believe though that the non-free should be as easily installable and
supported as main. Because clearly not everyone cares about
free/non-free too much and clearly some things from non-free are very
very useful and needed.
Ondrej
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