Re: License notices

[Bastiaan Veelo]

Peter,

Peter Simons wrote:

> Bastiaan,
>
> I think you may have misunderstood what I'm trying to do.
> The @license keyword is a _temporary_ addition that has no
> other purpose but to be replaced by a verbatim text license.
> Once all macros have their correct @license assigned, I run
> a tool which strips the @license tag and adds the
> appropriate disclaimer instead, right at the top of the m4
> source, exactly like it is in your macro.
>
> After that, I say "cvs commit", @license is gone, and _all_
> files have a correct disclaimer that looks alike everywhere
> so that I can parse it reliably if I want to.
>
> @license is not meant to be a permanent addition to the
> format. The verbatim license is supposed to appear in the
> sources in CVS as well as on the web site.
>  

Yes, a misunderstanding, thank goodness. It appears I was not the only 
one to have misunderstood you on this point, and I hope you understand 
what the commotion was about. I fear the cause of the misunderstanding 
is that you never explained the procedure in this detail before, IIRC, 
and because you want to make this move in the live archive, the head 
branch of CVS, which I had not expected.

I will remove the verbal license text from my macro for now, and await 
your grand swap. I will keep my copyright notice for the time being and 
remove the generated one when that time comes, in order to keep the 
multiple years (in reference of 
http://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/html_node/Copyright-Notices.html). Is 
that okay with you?

Let's hope the transition runs smoothly from now on! Man, comminication 
is hard!

> With that in mind, I'll reply to your posting:
>
> >> (2) Once we know all @license tags are properly
> >> assigned, a tool can insert the multi-line, verbatim
> >> text automatically, and then it is _guaranteed_ that
> >> this text looks alike everywhere and that it can be
> >> recognized by software.
>
> > This is acceptable I think as long as it is in an
> > intermediate stage, somewhere off-line, and files are
> > equiped with a verbatim text before they go online.
>
> I don't understand what you mean.
>  

It is the same as you explained above, only that you do this transition 
while being on-line all the time, distributing every intermediate step 
(such as @license). This surprises me, but I am sure you have a reason 
for it.

> >> @license [optional keyword]
> >> verbose text
>
> Multi-line keywords are a significant change to the format.
> All keywords we support so far use a single line. Thus, the
> format can be parsed by a line-parser (a.k.a. regex) rather
> than requiring a full-blown recursive-descent parser or
> other trickery. That's why I am against adding a multi-line
> keyword, particularly one that we don't even need.
>  

I am sure Guido did not understand that the @license tag is going away 
after the transition is done, which is probably why he proposed this 
mixed keyword/fulltext format.

> >> All this tells me: Shit, why bother? Let the tool do it!
>
> > Let the tool do what? Generate copyright and license
> > notices in HTML? That is okay if you can. [...] But the
> > most important is that the m4 _source_ is licensed!
>
> It is. Right now, there is a big, fat @license keyword;
> which is more than we had for the last six years. (And more
> than sf.net does.) And in two or three weeks the entire
> problem is solved.
>  

Not a problem. I can live with just the keyword as long as I know it is 
intermediate.

> >> [...] to insert lines of lines of redundant disclaimers
> >> that say "Yeah, I really don't care what you do with
> >> this software. And under no circumstances must you
> >> remove this statement so that everybody knows I don't
> >> care. Go figure."
>
> > But everybody has to know that, otherwise they can not
> > copy, change or distribute...
>
> Why not? Who is gonna sue them for copyright violation? You
> won't, obviously, so who is gonna sue them?
>  

I won't, but they can not be sure.

> Besides, if anyone wanted to use bnv_have_qt in some
> high-profile commercial product and they weren't sure about
> the exact licensing conditions ... then they'd have your
> e-mail address. All this talk about how a 5 line macro in
> the archive absolutely HAS to have a copyright statement and
> licensing conditions spelled out in verbose is straight out
> of a parallel universe for me.
>  

It is not only high-profile commerce that should be concerned. Copyright 
is in effect whether you write free or non-free or commercial software. 
Even though we live in different universes, I am sure we'll get along in 
the end :-)

> > I hope it is clear now!
>
> So do I. ;-)
>  

It is. :-)

Bastiaan.