[Fedora-legal-list] Guidelines clarification - including additional license texts

[Tom Callaway]

On 07/27/2012 08:13 AM, Mikolaj Izdebski wrote:

> Some package maintainers don't include separate copies of license
> files because they believe this would be against the Licensing
> Guidelines. I would ask you to clarify the Guidelines to explicitly
> allow including separate license copies in cases that it is required,
> like the case mentioned above.

Okay. I've rewritten the License Text Guidelines as follows:

If the source package includes the text of the license(s) in its own
file, then that file, containing the text of the license(s) for the
package must be included in %doc. If the source package does not include
the text of the license(s), the packager should contact upstream and
encourage them to correct this mistake.

In cases where the upstream has chosen a license that requires that a
copy of the license text be distributed along with the binaries and/or
source code, but does not provide a copy of the license text (in the
source tree, or in some rare cases, anywhere), the packager should do
their best to point out this confusion to upstream. This sometimes
occurs when an upstream project's only reference to a license is in a
README (where they simply say "licensed under the FOO license"), on
their website, or when they simply do not check a copy of the license
into their Source tree. Common licenses that require including their
texts with all derivative works include ASL 2.0, EPL, BSD and MIT.
Packagers should point out to upstream that by not including a proper
full license text, they are making it difficult or impossible for anyone
to comply with their desired license terms.

However, in situations where upstream is unresponsive, unable, or
unwilling to provide proper full license text as part of the source
code, and the indicated license requires that the full license text be
included, Fedora Packagers must either:

*   Include a copy of what they believe the license text is intended to
be, as part of the Fedora package in %doc, in order to remain in
compliance. It is worth noting that this may place some additional risk
on the packager, however, Fedora believes that this risk is minimized by
the fact that if the upstream disagrees with what we have distributed as
the full license text, they can easily remedy this by making full
license text available in the source code. Packagers who choose to do
this should ensure that they have exhausted all attempts to work with
upstream to include the license text as part of the source code, or at
least, to confirm the full license text explicitly with the upstream, as
this minimizes the risk on the packager. Packagers should also take
copies of license texts from reliable and canonical sources (such as the
Fedora Software Licenses page, the FSF licenses page, or the OSI license
list), whenever possible.

*   Choose not to package that software for Fedora.

It is important to reiterate that in situations where the indicated
license does not imply a requirement that the license be distributed
along with the source/binaries, Fedora packagers are NOT required to
manually include the full license text when it is absent from the source
code. but are still encouraged to point out this issue to upstream and
encourage them to remedy it.


https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Packaging:LicensingGuidelines#License_Text

~tom

==
Fedora Project