Bug#551763: License for FOCAL Interpreter
Daniel Moerner wrote:
On 12/07/2009 08:31 AM, Dave Pitts wrote:
Daniel Moerner wrote:
Hi David,
I see that you've done the work to write an interpreter for the FOCAL
language. Recently, a request for this package was filed in Debian
GNU/Linux.[1] I'd be interested in packaging your interpreter for
distribution in Debian (and by extension, Ubuntu) because it seems like
a useful piece of history.
Never thought anybody would be that interested in Focal....
Well, "that interested" is a loose term! But at least one person was
interested, and I think it's helpful to keep work like this around for
people to use. It has 82 downloads on Softpedia, at the very least.
I also get downloads of the tarball from my site (Not through Softpedia).
If we're going to productize this program. I'm going to add files to the
tarball like ChangeLog, README, etc. Do you have any other
recommendations? Also, I'll start the version numbering at 1.0.0 for
this distribution work.
However, before doing that, I would need clarification on the license. I
don't see one in the source. Under what conditions is the distribution
of your interpreter permitted?
Some good choices for free licenses may be the GPL or the 3-clause BSD
license, depending on your taste. Normally, Public Domain is not as good
of a choice.[2]
Well, I did the initial coding, in Pascal, of Focal waaaay before
anybody thought of GPL or BSD licenses. I converted it to C in the early
1980s on Dec VAX running VMS. So, what would be the easiest way to set
it up? I signed GPL stuff for GCC and GAWK work that I've done in the past.
Since it's your work, there should be no trouble. For the gcc work it
was a bit different because you would have had to sign over your
copyright to the FSF. In this case, you don't have to forfeit your
copyright. All you would have to do is choose a license that you like
and add it to the source tarball. This would state the license under
which you authorize redistribution of Focal as copyright holder of the
code of the interpreter.
OK, after looking at the GCC source, we have a COPYING file, that
contains the license, and comment blocks in the source like:
* FOCAL is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
* the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
* Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) any later
* version.
*
* FOCAL is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
* WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
* FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License
* for more details.
*
* You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
* along with FOCAL; see the file COPYING. If not, write to the Free
* Software Foundation, 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA
* 02111-1307, USA.
Anything else?
Also, is there a versioning system you use for packaging? Or is this the
final version of FOCAL?
I occasionally fix things and haven't given much thought to versioning
the code. I guess I could start it at version 1.0.0 for these release
purposes.
What do you think? And how many are interested in a package?
It's impossible to say in advance how many people would be interested.
But it's my view at least that making pieces of history like this
accessible to the public is always worthwhile.
Regards,
Daniel
--
Dave Pitts PULLMAN: Travel and sleep in safety and comfort.
dpitts@cozx.com My other RV IS a Pullman (Colorado Pine).
http://www.cozx.com
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