Hello,
Could legal give its opinion on this bug
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1713604
which is waiting since 2019. Tom added a comment saying he will disciss it internally but no news has been posted since then
Best regards,
Robert-André
On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 11:49 AM Robert-André Mauchin zebob.m@gmail.com wrote:
Hello,
Could legal give its opinion on this bug
https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1713604
which is waiting since 2019. Tom added a comment saying he will disciss it internally but no news has been posted since then
The issue here (at least the only one I'm aware of) was that the package contains WSDL files that are nominally under a license that does not meet Fedora's policy on acceptable licenses.
The default conclusion here should be that the package is not acceptable for Fedora. However, if you or anyone else would like to provide an explanation of how these files are used in this package, that might support a different conclusion. I do not really have the bandwidth to look into this myself.
Richard
On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 2:19 PM Richard Fontana rfontana@redhat.com wrote:
The issue here (at least the only one I'm aware of) was that the package contains WSDL files that are nominally under a license that does not meet Fedora's policy on acceptable licenses.
The default conclusion here should be that the package is not acceptable for Fedora. However, if you or anyone else would like to provide an explanation of how these files are used in this package, that might support a different conclusion. I do not really have the bandwidth to look into this myself.
Arguably, this file is content, not code. In that case, it should be acceptable under the "content licenses may restrict modification" exception: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:Main#Good_Licenses_3
CC BY-ND is acceptable under that same policy. The only restriction imposed by the notice in the files the prohibition against modifcation:
Recipients of this document may copy, distribute, publish, or display this document so long as this copyright notice, license and disclaimer are retained with all copies of the document. No license is granted to modify this document.
So the main question would be if WSDL files can be treated as content or if they're code. A search of this list's archives for "WSDL" only returns the message I'm replying to. I haven't yet been able to find external precedent.
On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 3:01 PM Ben Cotton bcotton@redhat.com wrote:
On Tue, Aug 25, 2020 at 2:19 PM Richard Fontana rfontana@redhat.com wrote:
The issue here (at least the only one I'm aware of) was that the package contains WSDL files that are nominally under a license that does not meet Fedora's policy on acceptable licenses.
The default conclusion here should be that the package is not acceptable for Fedora. However, if you or anyone else would like to provide an explanation of how these files are used in this package, that might support a different conclusion. I do not really have the bandwidth to look into this myself.
Arguably, this file is content, not code. In that case, it should be acceptable under the "content licenses may restrict modification" exception: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:Main#Good_Licenses_3
CC BY-ND is acceptable under that same policy. The only restriction imposed by the notice in the files the prohibition against modifcation:
Recipients of this document may copy, distribute, publish, or display this document so long as this copyright notice, license and disclaimer are retained with all copies of the document. No license is granted to modify this document.
So the main question would be if WSDL files can be treated as content or if they're code. A search of this list's archives for "WSDL" only returns the message I'm replying to. I haven't yet been able to find external precedent.
So from what I understood, if Fedora built this package, Fedora would be converting these WSDL files to C++ header files which are then compiled together with code which is licensed under GPLv3. Assuming that's correct, there are a couple of additional questions:
* Is the conversion of the WSDL files and the subsequent compilation of the generated header files something that would require a license to modify the WSDL files? * Is there some GPLv3 issue given that the WSDL file license is obviously not GPL-compatible?
We try to avoid getting into fair use rationale analysis in this setting but maybe that would apply here. OTOH perhaps Fedora should generally push back against these kinds of nonfree licenses that have long been promoted by standards organizations for what appear to be ill-conceived reasons.
Richard
-
Ben Cotton -
Richard Fontana -
Robert-André Mauchin