Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 03:09:22 -0700 From: asami@cs.berkeley.edu (Satoshi Asami) To: ports@freebsd.org Subject: copyright notices for ports/packages Message-ID: <199508281009.DAA04757@silvia.HIP.Berkeley.EDU>
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I think we should include copyright notices in our ports/packages.
Some of the copyrights even require that the notice be retained, and
that includes binary distribution too (I think).
How should we go about this?
(1) Require the ports to put them in a fixed location, for example,
${PREFIX}/share/${PKGNAME}/Copyright. This can be done by using a
post-install target.
(2) Add another argument to pkg_create and put it in the pkg/ subdir
(and modify bsd.port.mk to pick it up automatically).
(2') Similar to (2), but tuck it into the end of DESCR.
Idea (1) will not require the copyright notice itself to be in our cvs
tree, which is usually good. On the other hand, (2) and (2') will
require the porter (upgrader) to make sure to import the new version
of the copyright notice (or at least check, as these things usually
don't change).
(2) will require more work to our tools than (2'), but makes is
clearer to the user the distinction of "description" and "copyright".
(Also, (2) will stand in our way less when someone finally gets to
write that super-GUI "view all ports at a glance" tool that has the
package name at the top, COMMENT to our right and DESCR and PLIST side
by side.... :)
Personally, I think (1) is the way to go, because there isn't any need
to have the copyright notice in our cvs tree, as it is in the original
tarfile already. The "ports" themselves don't contain any original
source (except for portions of the patches, but I don't think that
will put us in legal problems), so we are required to carry the
notices only in binary packages, not in our ports tree.
Also, the space requirements aren't that small...these things
sometimes are quite lengthy, and with almost 350 ports, they can add
up quickly (e.g., the GPLv2 is 18KB long).
Opinions?
Satoshi
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