Re: Comparison of Raul Miller/20040119-13 and Andrew Suffield/GR Editorial
On Tue, Jan 20, 2004 at 03:14:30PM -0500, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> Raul Miller | Andrew Suffield
> 1. Debian will remain 100% free | 1. Debian will remain 100% free
> software |
>
> Pretty much the same thing. Slight wording difference.
Well, except for the ambiguity of what "100% free" means without the word
"software". "Free software" is very specific, because of the DFSG.
Also note that sections 2-4 should be nearly identical between our
proposals. [Neither of us has presented any rationale for changing
those sections.]
...
> Raul adds in a transition phrase and the word "internet" (Raul: isn't
> Internet capitalized?).
Sometimes yes, sometimes no. I'm using it as an adjective, not as a noun,
not as a trademark, and not as part of a title. It's my impression that
lower case is better here.
...
> Raul Miller | Andrew Suffield
> --------------------------------------|------------------------------------
> The software in "non-free" | The
> satisfies some, but not all, of our | packages in these areas are not part
> guidelines | of the Debian system, although they
> | have been configured for use with
> | Debian.
>
> These are fairly different. Raul does not include the statement that
> these are not part of Debian. Doesn't leaving that out cause a
> problem when compared to clause 1?
Could you be more specific?
In my mind, that "not a part of Debian" meant "not a part of main".
Anyways, if leaving it out creates a problem, I'd like to understand
what the probem is so I can fix it.
...
> Also, I'm not sure that software in non-free has to satisfy any of the
> guidelines. Certainly not DFSG 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, or 10. I'm not sure
> why they'd have to satisfy 7 or 9, either, provided it is still legal for
> Debian to distribute it. So this may be a material change.
If this is a material change, we might have to stop distributing some
package.
To my knowledge, we wouldn't -- as I understand it, every package we
distrbute in non-free satisfies at least some of our guidelines. But if
we are distributing some package which satisfies none of our guidelines,
I guess I'm assuming we can live without it.
...
> Raul's wording covers more than CD manufacturers. Raul's wording also
> seems to suggest that we guarantee the distributability of software
> in main.
Yes. Guaranteeing the distributability of software in main is one of
the major points our guidelines address.
> Raul does not state we provide our bug tracking system for non-free
> packages, which Andrew does.
If we make that statement at all, we should certainly include main.
I elected to remove the statement from section 5. We already indicate
in sections 2 and 3 that we track bugs, and section 4 indicates that
we're going to make choices in the best interests of our users.
Since I've also gotten rid of the overly ambiguous "not in debian"
statement, I don't think I need to spell this issue out any further.
[p.s. I'm still thinking about whether "free software community", "Free
Software community" or "Free Software Community" is best. I'm not sure
how I'd even make such a choice -- it's certainly not something I've
spent any time thinking about.]
Thanks,
--
Raul
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