Re: DFSG violations in Lenny: new proposal
On Tue, Nov 11 2008, Ben Hutchings wrote:
> On Tue, 2008-11-11 at 08:30 -0600, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
>> On Mon, Nov 10 2008, Ben Hutchings wrote:
>>
>> > So far as I can see, the only significant difference between #5 and #2
>> > (or #3) is the requirement that upstream distributes "under a license
>> > that complies with the DFSG".
>>
>> Yes. Without that clause, one can say we could ship something
>> like nvidia drivers in main -- since we are legally allowed to do so,
>> even though the license might be very non-free otherwise. That opens a
>> hole the size of a bus to let non-free code into Debian. That earned it
>> the "overrides the SC" label.
>
> The nvidia drivers have never been in main, and AFAIK no-one claims they
> are firmware.
I think you need a "dict like" about here.
>
>> > But it is surely irrelevant whether the licence text says we can
>> > modify the source when the copyright holder is deliberately
>> > withholding the source. (Further, in some cases the licence is GPLv2
>> > which requires us to redistribute the source we don't have - though
>> > thankfully there are only 1 or 2 such cases left.)
>>
>> How do you know the author is withholding the source? Yes, I
>> suspect they are, and I doubt that the blobs are the preferred form of
>> modification, but these are judgement calls, not proof. I mean, I have
>> written programs in hex in my time; the hex blob _was_ the source
>> code. One of these programs was even for a radio transmitter on a
>> breadboard.
>
> But these are already DFSG-compliant and no resolution is required to
> say so.
Umm. All the so called blobs would be fine in main if we were
convinced they were the preferred form of modification. Thing is, we
think they are not. We are not sure, but the chances are they are
not. So, the resolution is not to act on our gut, but to only act if we
have proof. We do not.
>
>> All we are doing is is not throwing out code we suspect, but do
>> not know for a certainty, might violate the license it is distributed
>> under. Said license being DFSG free, though.
> [...]
>
> That's an even greater feat of double-think than is usual around
> non-free.
If you have proof that the blobs are definitely not the
preferred form of modification, and thus are in violation ofthe
kernel's GPL, please present the proof, and not just to us, but to the
broader kernel community.
Until you have proof, do not engage in hyperbole like "feat of
double-think". It just showcases sloppy thinking.
manoj
--
Pushing 40 is exercise enough.
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/~srivasta/>
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