• Bug#1102356: hx: BSD-3-clause references different license

    From Bastian Germann@21:1/5 to All on Tue Apr 8 09:40:02 2025
    Source: hx
    Version: 25.01.1-4
    Severity: important

    The BSD-3-clause stanza in debian/copyright refers to /usr/share/common-licenses/BSD, which has a slightly different than the
    actual helix-view/tests/encoding/LICENSE-WHATWG. Please copy the license
    text.

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  • From Bastian Germann@21:1/5 to jonas@jones.dk on Tue Apr 8 22:10:01 2025
    Control: reopen -1

    On Tue, 08 Apr 2025 13:43:45 +0200 Jonas Smedegaard <jonas@jones.dk> wrote:
    Control: tag -1 wontfix

    Hi Bastian,

    Quoting Bastian Germann (2025-04-08 09:36:22)
    The BSD-3-clause stanza in debian/copyright refers to /usr/share/common-licenses/BSD, which has a slightly different than the actual helix-view/tests/encoding/LICENSE-WHATWG. Please copy the license text.

    There is an essential word missing in your text above, about what it is
    you report as being slightly different. I assume you mean either "line wrapping" or "wording".

    Wording. I do not care about line wrapping.

    I agree that the two files are not identical, but I disagree that
    varying whitespace and the few different words is an issue for Debian:
    The legal terms are identical except if treating /usr/share/common-licenses/BSD as specifically and only ever covering
    "The Regents of the University of California" which is not how I treat
    that text; an approach that I believe is shared with lawyers involved
    with SPDX and that I also believe is not in conflict with Debian common practice.

    The point of SPDX is that they have a framework where they have specified text substitutions.
    There is nothing comparable in Debian's copyright file approach.

    If you meant something else, then please do clarify.

    If I understood you correctly and you insist that there is an important
    issue to fix here, then please elaborate, so that we can share our
    different viewpoints with other legally interested people in Debian.

    Actually, this is a serious issue. But I know that some people disagree.
    That is why I have filed it as important. However, I do not think that
    FTP Masters disagree with my take. I have seen packages being rejected
    from NEW because they did not have the correct BSD-3-clause variant with
    the 3rd clause and the legal disclaimer matching the actual source.

    Also, the Policy ยง12 footnote [9] suggests otherwise:
    "The University of California BSD license is also included in base-files as /usr/share/common-licenses/BSD, but given
    the brevity of this license, its specificity to code whose copyright is held by the Regents of the University of
    California, and the frequency of minor wording changes, its text should be included in the copyright file rather than
    referencing this file."

    [9]: https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html#id19

    Cheers,
    Bastian

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