Bug#414844: copyright notices and clarity
Rafael writes:
> Look, for instance, at the text of the GPL, around this excerpt:
>
> How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
> [snip]
> To do so, attach the following notices to the program. It is safest to
> attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively convey
> the exclusion of warranty; and each file should have at least the
> "copyright" line and a pointer to where the full notice is found.
Simon Tatham (upstream for tweak) mentioned this discussion to me in
the pub. I'm a bit concerned to see this piece of what I think is
cargo cult lore.
Those instructions in the GPL are there to give clear directions to
someone who wants to apply the GPL to their program and be able to
enforce it later. They are not intended as some kind of standard that
a program has to meet for the licence to be considered valid. I agree
that it is not ideal that the program doesn't have a proper copyright
notice in every file but it shouldn't be a critical failing for us.
What is required for a program to be in Debian is that we (which
includes the developers, our users, the ftpmasters, etc.) are _clear_
on what the licence is, and which files are covered by what licences.
Since the upstream tarball contains only files written by Simon, the
licence on that is clear (particularly now he's clarified it with his
email - and you should copy the email into the source package so that
everyone can see it).
Of course the Debian package contains files with varying copyright
status - at the very least, the Debian packaging has a different
author. So what you should IMO do is write (eg in the
debian/copyright) a clear statement about which files were written by
who and what the licence is. If you ever modify one of the
upstream-provided files, you should add a proper notice at the top
making clear the original authorship, the author of the changes, etc.
But I think there is no need for the files that come unchanged from
upstream to be edited, and there is no need to ask upstream to change
their package. Of course I approve of you telling upstream about this
small way in which their distribution might be improved but it's not a
showstopper problem that they don't.
Ian.
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