Mercurial > emacs
view admin/notes/copyright @ 77867:f565d6a9aaaa
Include site-lisp directory in bin-i386 distribution.
| author | Jason Rumney <jasonr@gnu.org> |
|---|---|
| date | Sun, 03 Jun 2007 20:20:15 +0000 |
| parents | b43e6f8f3e6e |
| children | f0c94e8197f7 |
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Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc. See the end of the file for license conditions. NOTES ON COPYRIGHTS AND LICENSES Some terminology: A "copyright notice" consists of one or a few lines of this format: "Copyright (C) 2006, 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc." A "license notice" is a statement of permissions, and is usually much longer, eg the text "GNU Emacs is free software...". Summary for the impatient: 1. Don't add code to Emacs written by someone other than yourself without thinking about the legal aspect. Even if the changes are trivial, consider if they combine with previous changes by the same author to make a non-trivial total. If so, make sure they have an assignment. If adding a whole file adjust the copyright statements in the file. 2. When installing code written by someone else, the ChangeLog entry should be in the name of the author of the code, not the person who installs it. I think it is helpful to put the author (if not yourself) in the CVS log as well; and to not install any of your own changes in the same commit. 3. With images, add the legal info to a README file in the directory containing the image. 4. If you add a lot of text to a previously trivial file that had no legal notices, consider if you should add a copyright statement. 5. Please don't just add an FSF copyright without checking that is the right thing to do. Every non-trivial file distributed through the Emacs CVS should be self-explanatory in terms of copyright and license. This includes files that are not distributed in Emacs releases (for example, the admin/ directory), because the whole Emacs CVS is publicly available. The definition of triviality is a little vague, but a rule of thumb is that any file with less than 15 lines of actual content is trivial. If a file is auto-generated (eg ldefs-boot.el) from another one in the CVS, then it does not really matter about adding a copyright statement to the generated file. Legal advice says that we could, if we wished, put a license notice even in trivial files, because copyright law in general looks at the overall work as a whole. It is not _necessary_ to do so, and rms prefers that we do not. This means one needs to take care that trivial files do not grow and become non-trivial without having a license added. NB consequently, if you add a lot of text to a small file, consider whether your changes have made the file worthy of a copyright notice, and if so, please add one. It can be helpful to put a reminder comment at the start of a trivial file, eg: "add a license notice if this grows to > 10 lines of code". The years in the copyright notice should be updated every year (see file "years" in this directory). The PS versions of refcards etc should display copyright notices (an exception to the rule about "generated" files), but these can just display the latest year. The full list of years should be kept in comments in the source file. If these are distributed in CVS, check in a regenerated version when the tex files are updated. Copyright changes should be propagated to any associated repositories (eg Gnus, MH-E), but I think in every case this happens automatically (?). All README (and other such text files) that are non-trivial should contain copyright statements and GPL license notices, exactly as .el files do (see e.g. README in the top-level directory). Before 2007, we used a simple, short statement permitting copying and modification provided legal notices were retained. In Feb 2007 we switched to the standard GPL text, on legal advice. Some older text files in etc/ should, however, keep their current licenses (see below for list). For image files, the copyright and license details should be recorded in a README file in each directory with images. (Legal advice says that we need not add notices to each image file individually, if they allow for that.). It is recommended to use the word "convert" to describe the automatic process of changing an image from one format to another (http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-02/msg00618.html). When installing a file with an "unusual" license (after checking first it is ok), put a copy of the copyright and license in the file (if possible. It's ok if this makes the file incompatible with its original format, if it can still be used by Emacs), or in a README file in the relevant directory. The vast majority of files are copyright FSF and distributed under the GPL. A few files (mainly related to language and charset support) are copyright AIST alone, or both AIST and FSF. (Contact Kenichi Handa with questions about legal issues in such files.) In all these cases, the copyright years in each file should be updated each year. There are some exceptions to the points in the previous paragraph, and these are listed below for reference, together with any files where the copyright needs to be updated in "unusual" ways. If you find any other such cases, please consult to check they are ok, and note them in this file. This includes missing copyright notices, and "odd" copyright holders. In most cases, individual authors should not appear in copyright statements. Either the copyright has been assigned (check copyright.list) to the FSF (in which case the original author should be removed and the year(s) transferred to the FSF); or else it is possible the file should not be in Emacs at all (please report!). Note that it seems painfully clear that one cannot rely on CVS logs, or even ChangeLogs, for older changes. People often installed changes from others, without recording the true authorship. [For reference, most of these points were established via email with rms, 2007/1, "Copyright years".] lib-src/etags.c # print_version lib-src/rcs2log # Copyright lisp/calc/calc-help.el # calc-full-help lisp/startup.el # fancy-splash-tail mac/Emacs.app/Contents/Resources/English.lproj/InfoPlist.strings mac/src/Emacs.r # resource 'vers' src/emacs.c - remember to change the latest copyright year in the --version output. [Post-release, will automate this like set-version does for version.] <top-level>/install-sh lispintro/install-sh - this file is copyright MIT, which is OK. Leave the copyright alone. src/m/news-r6.h public domain, leave alone. etc/BABYL, ms-kermit no notices (see below). etc/edt-user.doc - update BOTH notices in this file etc/emacs.csh - written by Michael DeCorte, who has no assignment. But trivial enough to not need license. etc/future-bug - doesn't need a humourless disclaimer, because Karl Fogel says we can consider it part of Emacs, and he has a blanker disclaimer for Emacs changes. (email to rgm "[Emacs-commit] emacs/etc future-bug", 2007028) etc/letter.pbm,letter.xpm - trivial, no notice needed. <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-02/msg00324.html> etc/FTP, ORDERS - trivial (at time of writing), no license needed etc/GNU, INTERVIEW, LINUX-GNU, MOTIVATION, SERVICE, THE-GNU-PROJECT, WHY-FREE rms: "These are statements of opinion or testimony. Their licenses should permit verbatim copying only. Please don't change the licenses that they have. They are distributed with Emacs but they are not part of Emacs." etc/HELLO standard notices. Just a note that although the file itself is not really copyrightable, in the wider context of it being part of Emacs (and written by those with assignments), a standard notice is fine. etc/MAILINGLISTS rms: simple license is fine for this file leim/CXTERM-DIC/4Corner.tit, ARRAY30.tit, CCDOSPY.tit, ECDICT.tit, ETZY.tit, PY-b5.tit, Punct-b5.tit, Punct.tit, QJ-b5.tit, QJ.tit, SW.tit, TONEPY.tit, ZOZY.tit - leave the copyrights alone. leim/MISC-DIC/CTLau-b5.html, CTLau.html, cangjie-table.b5, cangjie-table.cns, pinyin.map, ziranma.cin - leave the copyright alone. Note that pinyin.map, ziranma.cin (and hence the generated leim/quail/PY.el, ZIRANMA.el) are under GPLv1 or later. leim/SKK-DIC/SKK-JISYO.L ja-dic/ja-dic.el (the latter is auto-generated from the former). Leave the copyright alone. lib-src/etags.c Copyright information is duplicated in etc/ETAGS.README. Update that file too. Until 2007 etags.c was described as being copyright FSF and Ken Arnold. After some investigation in Feb 2007, then to the best of our knowledge we believe that the original 1984 Emacs version was based on the version in BSD4.2. See for example this 1985 post from Ken Arnold: <http://groups.google.com/group/mod.sources/browse_thread/thread/ffe5c55845a640a9> I have received enough requests for the current source to ctags to post it. Here is the latest version (what will go out with 4.3, modulo any bugs fixed during the beta period). It is the 4.2 ctags with recognition of yacc and lex tags added. See also a 1984 version of ctags (no copyright) posted to net.sources: <http://groups.google.com/group/net.sources/msg/a21b6c21be12a98d> Version of etags.c in emacs-16.56 duplicates comment typos. Accordingly, in Feb 2007 we added a 1984 copyright for the University of California and a revised BSD license. The terms of this require that the full license details be available in binary distributions - hence the file etc/ETAGS.README. The fact that the --version output just says "Copyright <year> FSF" is apparently OK from a legal point of view. lib-src/getopt1.c, getopt_int.h - these are from the GNU C library. Leave the copyrights alone. lisp/play/tetris.el - no special rules about the copyright. We note here that we believe (2007/1) there is no problem with our use of the name "tetris" or the concept. rms: "My understanding is that game rules as such are not copyrightable." <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-01/msg00960.html> rms: Legal advice is that we are ok and need not worry about this. lispref/doclicense.texi man/doclicense.texi - leave the copyright alone in this imported file. lisp/net/tramp.el - there are also copyrights in the body of the file. Update these too. lwlib/ rms (2007/02/17): "lwlib is not assigned to the FSF; we don't consider it part of Emacs. [...] Therefore non-FSF copyrights are ok in lwlib." NB don't change the GPL version used for lwlib .c and .h files (see below). FSF copyrights should only appear in files which have undergone non-trivial cumulative changes from the original versions in the Lucid Widget Library. NB this means that if you make non-trivial changes to a file with no FSF copyright, you should add one. Also, if changes are reverted to the extent that a file becomes basically the same as the original version, the FSF copyright should be removed. In my (rgm) opinion, as of Feb 2007, all the non-trivial files differ significantly from the original versions, with the exception of lwlib-Xm.h. Most of the changes that were made to this file have subsequently been reverted. Therefore I removed the FSF copyright from this file (which is arguably too trivial to merit a notice anyway). I added FSF copyright to the following files which did not have them already: Makefile.in, lwlib-Xaw.c, lwlib-int.h (borderline), lwlib-utils.c (borderline), lwlib.c, lwlib.h. Copyright years before the advent of public CVS in 2001 were those when I judged (from the CVS logs) that non-trivial amounts of change had taken place. I also adjusted the existing FSF years in xlwmenu.c, xlwmenu.h, and xlwmenuP.h on the same basis. Note that until Feb 2007, the following files in lwlib were lacking notices: lwlib-int.h, lwlib.h, lwlib-Xaw.h, lwlib-Xlw.h, lwlib-utils.h The following files did not list a Lucid copyright: xlwmenu.h, xlwmenuP.h. To the best of our knowledge, all the code files in lwlib were originally part of the Lucid Widget Library, even if they did not say so explicitly. For example, they were all present in Lucid Emacs 19.1 in 1992. The exceptions are the two Xaw files, which did not appear till Lucid Emacs 19.9 in 1994. The file lwlib-Xaw.h is too trivial to merit a copyright notice, but would presumably have the same one as lwlib-Xaw.c. We have been unable to find a true standalone version of LWL, if there was such a thing, to check definitively. To clarify the situation, in Feb 2007 we added Lucid copyrights and GPL notices to those files lacking either that were non-trivial, namely: lwlib-int.h, lwlib.h, xlwmenu.h, xlwmenuP.h. This represents our best understanding of the legal status of these files. We also clarified the notices in Makefile.in, which was originally the Makefile auto-generated from Lucid's Imakefile. As of Feb 2007, the following files are considered too trivial for notices: lwlib-Xaw.h, lwlib-Xlw.h, lwlib-utils.h. The version of lwlib/ first installed in Emacs seems to be the same as that used in Lucid Emacs 19.8 (released 6-sep-93); except the two Xaw files, which did not appear till Athena support was added in Lucid Emacs 19.9. In Lucid Emacs 19.1, all files were under GPLv1 or later, but by Lucid Emacs 19.8, lwlib.c and xlwmenu.c had been switched to v2 or later. These are the versions that were first installed in Emacs. So in GNU Emacs, these two files have been under v2 or later since 1994. It seems that it was the intention of Lucid to use v1 or later (excepting the two files mentioned previously); so this is the license we have used when adding notices to code that did not have notices originally. Although we have the legal right to switch to v2 or later, rms prefers that we do not do so. man/*.texi - All manuals should be under GFDL, and should include a copy of it, so that they can be distributed separately. faq.texi has a different license, for some reason no-one can remember. http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-04/msg00583.html http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-04/msg00618.html msdos/is_exec.c, sigaction.c - these files are copyright DJ Delorie. Leave the copyrights alone. Leave the Eli Zaretskii copyright in is_exec.c alone. See the msdos/README file for the legal history of these files. oldXMenu/ Keep the "copyright.h" method used by X11, rather than moving the licenses into the files. Note that the original X10.h did not use copyright.h, but had an explicit notice, which we retain. If you make non-trivial changes to a file which does not have an FSF notice, add one and a GPL notice (as per Activate.c). If changes to a file are reverted such that it becomes essentially the same as the original X11 version, remove the FSF notice and GPL. Only the files which differ significantly from the original X11 versions should have FSF copyright and GPL notices. At time of writing (Feb 2007), this is: Activate.c, Create.c, Internal.c. I (rgm) established this by diff'ing the current files against those in X11R1, and when I found significant differences looking in the ChangeLog for the years they originated (the CVS logs are truncated before 1999). I therefore removed the FSF notices (added in 200x) from the other files. There are some borderline cases IMO: AddSel.c, InsSel.c, XMakeAssoc.c, XMenu.h. For these I erred on the side of NOT adding FSF notices. With regards to whether the files we have changed should have GPL added or not, rms says (2007-02-25, "oldXmenu issues"): It does not make much difference, because oldXmenu is obsolete except for use in Emacs (and it is not normally used in Emacs any more either). So, to make things simple, please put our changes under the GPL. insque.c had no copyright notice until 2005. The version of insque.c added to Emacs 1992-01-27 is essentially the same as insremque.c added to glic three days later by Roland McGrath, with an FSF copyright and GPL, but no ChangeLog entry: <http://sources.redhat.com/cgi-bin/cvsweb.cgi/~checkout~/libc/misc/insremque.c?\ rev=1.1&cvsroot=glibc> To the best of his recollection, McGrath (who has a copyright assignment) was the author of this file (email from roland at frob.com to rms, 2007-02-23, "Where did insque.c come from?"). The FSF copyright and GPL in this file are therefore correct as far as we understand it. Imakefile had no legal info in Feb 2007, but was obviously based on the X11 version (which also had no explicit legal info). As it was unused, I removed it. It would have the same MIT copyright as Makefile.in does now. src/gmalloc.c - contains numerous copyrights from the GNU C library. Leave them alone. src/acldef.h, chpdef.h, ndir.h - see comments below. These files are OK to be released with Emacs 22, but we may want to revisit them afterwards. ** Some notes on resolved issues, for historical information only etc/TERMS rms: "surely written either by me or by ESR. (If you can figure out which year, I can probably tell you which.) Either way, we have papers for it." It was present in Emacs-16.56 (15-jul-85). rms: "Then I conclude it was written by me." etc/ulimit.hack Very obsolete file removed March 2007. Doesn't say who the author is, but web-search suggests Karl Kleinpaste, who has no Emacs assignment. Trivial anyway. http://groups.google.com/group/comp.unix.shell/browse_thread/thread/bf3df496994\ 9f1df/7e5922c67b3a98fb http://groups.google.com/group/comp.unix.questions/msg/cc7e49cacfd1ccb4 (original 1987 source) lisp/term/README - had no copyright notice till Feb 2007. ChangeLog.3 suggests it was written by Eric Raymond. When asked by rms on 14 Feb 2007 he said: I don't remember writing it, but it reads like my prose and I believe I wrote the feature(s) it's describing. So I would have been the likeliest person to write it. Odds are that I did, but I'm not certain. Accordingly, FSF copyright was added. src/unexhp9k800.c (and dependent src/m/sr2k.h) http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-02/msg00138.html - briefly removed due to legal uncertainly Jan-Mar 2007. The relevant assignment is under "hp9k800" in copyright.list. File was written by John V. Morris at HP, and disclaimed by the author and HP. So this file is public domain. K Rodgers changes It was pointed out that K Rodgers only had assigments for VC and ps-print, but had changed several other files. We tried to contact him for a general assignment, but he proved uncommunicative (despite initially indicating to rms he would sign an assignment). As a result, his changes were removed and/or rewritten independently. For details, see threads: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-04/msg00225.html http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-04/msg00257.html But then an assignment arrived before the release of Emacs 22: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-04/msg01427.html lisp/progmodes/python.el Dave Love alerted us to a potential legal problem: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-pretest-bug/2007-04/msg00459.html On consultation with a lawyer, we found there was no problem: http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-05/msg00466.html ** Issues that are "fixed" for the release of Emacs 22, but we may wish to revisit later in more detail admin/check-doc-strings File says it's in the public domain, but that might not make it so. etc/BABYL File written long ago by authors with no assignment. Keep them without notices for now, try and contact authors if possible. Be ready to remove these files if the authors ever object. etc/ms-kermit etc/e/eterm-color.ti src/acldef.h, chpdef.h, ndir.h On legal advice from Matt Norwood, the following comment was added to these files in Feb/Mar 2007: The code here is forced by the interface, and is not subject to copyright, constituting the only possible expression of the algorithm in this format. With the addition of this notice, these files are OK for the upcoming Emacs-22 release. Post-release, we can revisit this issue and possibly add a list of all authors who have changed these files. (details in email from Matt Norwood to rms, 2007/02/03). etc/ms-7bkermit Says it was written by Andy Lowry and Joel Spolsky. No entry for either in copyright.list. NB this file is not "constrained" like ms-kermit (rms: "We know it isn't. A comment at the front says it has other bindings which might be handy."). File removed March 2007. Re-add if clear up status at some point. etc/Xkeymap.txt No info on author. File removed March 2007. rms: "It says it is RLK's way of remapping his keyboard, so it is not constrained. I think it was written by RLK. Let's delete it; if we contact RLK again, we can put it back." Actually, RLK == Robert Krawitz has an Emacs assignment. So this could be restored if it is still useful, but Jan Djärv says it is obsolete: <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/emacs-devel/2007-03/msg00673.html> src/m/mips4.h, news-risc.h, pmax.h src/s/aix3-2.h, bsd386.h, hpux8.h, hpux9.h, irix4-0.h, irix5-0.h, isc2-2.h, netbsd.h, osf1.h, sol2-3.h, sunos4-0.h, usg5-4-2.h - all these (not obviously trivial) files were missing copyrights till Feb 2007, when FSF copyright was added. Matt Norwood advised: For now, I think the best policy is to assume that we do have assignments from the authors (I recall many of these header files as having been originally written by rms), and to attach an FSF copyright with GPL notice. We can amend this if and when we complete the code audit. Any additions to these files by non-assigned authors are arguably "de minimis" contributions to Emacs: small changes or suggestions to a work that are subsumed in the main authors' copyright in the entire work. Here is my (rgm) take on the details of the above files: mips4.h might be trivial? started trivial, been added to in tiny changes by those with FSF assignment, often result of email suggestions by others. news-risc.h started trivial. Grown by tiny additions, plus chunk from mips.h, which was and is Copyright FSF pmax.h started trivial. grown in tiny changes, except for maybe Jim Wilson's comment. ? irix4-0.h I would say started non-trivial (1992, rms). only tiny changes since installed. ? irix5-0.h I would say started non-trivial (1993, jimb, heavily based on irix4-0.h). A few borderline non-tiny changes since. ? isc2-2.h started trivial. 2 non-tiny change, in 1993. looks to be made up of several small tweaks from various sources. maybe non-tiny total changes from Karl Berry (no emacs assignment). osf1.h started trivial. grown in tiny changes (one borderline tiny change by fx in 2000, but most code was later removed). non-tiny addition in 2002 from m/alpha.h, but that was and is copyright FSF. usg5-4-2.h started non-trivial, but was heavily based on usg5-4.h, which was and is copyright FSF. only tiny changes since installed. sol2-3.h started trivial. only non-tiny change (1994) incorporated code from usg5-4.h, which was and is copyright FSF. aix3-2.h, bsd386.h, hpux8.h, hpux9.h, netbsd.h, sunos4-0.h started trivial, grown in tiny changes. netbsd.h: Roland McGrath said to rms (2007/02/17): "I don't really remember anything about it. If I put it in without other comment, then probably I wrote it myself." Someone might want to tweak the copyright years (for dates before 2001) that I used in all these files. Note: erring on the side of caution, I also added notices to some files I thought might be considered non-trivial (if one includes comment) in s/: aix4-1.h hiuxmpp.h hiuxwe2.h hpux10.h irix6-0.h irix6-5.h isc3-0.h ptx4.h sol2.h sunos4-0.h (everything with > 30 non-blank lines, which at least is _some_ kind of system) *** These are copyright issues that need not be fixed until after Emacs 22 is released (though if they can be fixed before, that is obviously good): Is it OK to just `cvs remove' a file for legal reasons, or is something more drastic needed? A removed file is still available from CVS, if suitable options are applied. (This CVS issue obviously does not affect a release). rms: will ask lawyer Make sure that all files with non-standard copyrights or licenses are noted in this file. REMOVED etc/gnu.xpm, nt/icons/emacs21.ico, nt/icons/sink.ico - Restore if find legal info. emacs21.ico is not due to Davenport. Geoff Voelker checked but could not find a record of where it came from. etc/images Image files from GTK, Gnome are under GPLv2 (no "or later"?). RMS will contact image authors in regards to future switch to v3. etc/TUTORIAL* (translations) switch to GPL (see english TUTORIAL) rms: "We can leave the TUTORIAL translations alone until their maintainers update them." Can adapt short license text from end of GPL translations at: http://www.gnu.org/licenses/translations.html Only a few sentences around the license notice need changing from previous version. Done: TUTORIAL.eo *** These are copyright issues still to be addressed: None known. This file is part of GNU Emacs. GNU Emacs 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. GNU Emacs 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 GNU Emacs; see the file COPYING. If not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301, USA.