Re: [fluid-dev] License trouble for Debian

[Bernat Arlandis i Mañó]

David Henningsson escrigué:
> Bernat Arlandis i Mañó skrev:
>   
> > David Henningsson escrigué:
> >     
> > > As part of adopting fluidsynth for Debian, I've run into license trouble.
> > >       
> > You shouldn't package every file in the developers repository, just what
> > is needed and compatible. I recommend you to use the current package in
> > debian as a starting point, it just packages the necessary files and
> > should work straightaway with the current FS version.
> >     
>
> I think you misunderstood me somehow. Files that are non-DFSG must be
> removed from the upstream source tarball (that is, what you download
> from savannah) and repackaged into a new source tarball before uploaded
> to the Debian repository. The previous maintainer did not do this
> properly and now I've got a release-critical bug that I must take care
> of and repackage both 1.0.7 and 1.0.8 before I can continue to work on
> releasing 1.0.9. :-(
>
> http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=524566
>
> To get back on topic, I'm not demanding that fluidsynth should be more
> Debian-friendly in the future, but if we want, we should consider:
>
> 1) Removing the files in the sf2 directory. I don't understand why those
> files are distributed with fluidsynth at all, and IMO they should be
> removed.
>
> 2) Relicense the documentation under a DFSG-compatible license. (IMO:
> This one is least important, as the documentation is available online
> anyway.)
>
> 3) Add a proper license notice to doc/example.sf2 so we know who made
> it, and under what terms we can use it.
>
> // David
>
>   
You should post the issue url in your first message so we can have all 
the information right from the start.

It's easy to fix for your package:
- The FS repository doesn't need to be DFSG-compatible.
- Josh could take away the non-compatible files from the source tarball 
he's done since they're not needed in general distribution and they 
might invalidate the LGPL license for the whole package.
- In case he doesn't remove them, it's really easy for you to remove the 
files from the source tarball for Debian. Ask Debian developers on how 
to make others aware that you're changing the source tarball.

Asking your questions in a Debian developers forum first will help you 
better solve your packaging doubts. They'll tell you when there's 
something wrong with upstream that you have to ask fixing.

--
Bernat Arlandis i Mañó