Am Montag, den 30.01.2006, 00:42 -0800 schrieb Walter Landry: > Daniel Leidert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > > I hope you can help with some ideas and also clear a few of my > > questions. I'm not a lawyer, so I hope, you can give a few hints. I'm > > writing manpages for the proprietary ATI driver, which are included in > > the Debian package. You can find the source here: > > > > http://cvs.wgdd.de/cgi-bin/cvsweb/fglrx_man/ > > > > At the moment the sources miss a license statement. More about the > > manpages can be found at Flavios fglrx mailing-list. > > > > http://www.stanchina.net/~flavio/debian/fglrx-archive/msg00925.html > > http://www.stanchina.net/~flavio/debian/fglrx-archive/msg01017.html > > > > 1) One thing I'm not sure about is, which license I should use, and if I > > maybe clash with the ATI license. So what do you think about the latter > > issue? Am I allowed to release the manpages under a free license or do I > > need permissions from ATI or do I need to give ATI a partial copyright > > or ...? To write the fglrx(4x) manpage I used information I found in > > http://www2.ati.com/drivers/firegl/readme0325.txt. Now this file > > states: > > > > /--------------- > > > Please read the entire contents of this document. Information in this > > > file may not appear in printed documentation or online help. > > \--------------- > > > > Does it mean, that I'm not allowed to use this information? How do you > > interpret this phrase? > > I interpret "may not" as meaning that the information will not > necessarily appear in the printed documentation etc., not that it is > not allowed to appear there. Unless we are dealing with someone who > has a history of interpreting phrases in a bizarre manner > (e.g. U. Washington), you should be fine. > > However, the end of the file says > > (c) Copyright 2002,2003 by ATI Technologies Inc. All rights reserved > > which means that you can't use the text in that file for anything. > But if you got your information by synthesizing many different > sources, including that file, you should be fine.
I used a lot of sources, but also this file. Shall I better still ask ATI for permissions to use the contents of this file? > > 2) I want to release them under a free license and therefor I plan to > > choose a license, which is based on the FreeBSD documentation license. > > It would read: > > > > /--------------- > > > Copyright (C) .... > > > > > > [snip FreeBSD documentation license] > > \-------------------- > > > > What do you think about this license? Is it DFSG-compliant? Can I apply > > it? Would you change parts (and if yes -> why?). One thing, I'm not sure > > about is the phrase "as the first lines". Normally the XML source will > > look like this > > There are two issues: > > 1) Someone may want to use a different format for the documentation. > For example, they may use LyX's internal format. So I would > change source to read "preferred form for modification (e.g. XML > DocBook)". Similarly, I would change "compiled form" to "other > forms". Ok. > 2) The phrase "as the first lines" is problematic. Someone may use > a different format in which putting the list of claims and > conditions in the first lines is impossible or silly. Ok. I will remove this phrase. > With that said, it looks like you just modified the BSD license. The FreeBSD documentation license is a modified BSD license. > I > would recommend that you just use the BSD license, with a nonbinding > side note mentioning what you view as source and binary. Maybe you are right. I better use the BSD license and modify it a bit for my own usage. > Something like > > Note: Source is here meant as the preferred form for modification, > such as XML DocBook. Ok. Here my suggestion: /------------------ > Copyright (C) .... > All rights reserved. > > Redistribution and use in source (the preferred form of modification, such as > XML DocBook) and other forms (SGML, HTML, PDF, PostScript, RTF, Groff and so > forth) with or without modification, are permitted provided that the > following conditions are met: > > 1. Redistributions of source (the preferred form of modification, such as > XML DocBook) code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of > conditions and the following disclaimer. > > 2. Redistributions in other forms (transformed to other DTDs, converted > to PDF, PostScript, RTF, Groff and other formats) must reproduce the > above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following > disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with > the distribution. > > 3. Neither the name of the copyright owner nor the nor the names of its > contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from > this software without specific prior written permission. > > THIS DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS > IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE > IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE > ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE > LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR > CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF > SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS > INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN > CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) > ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS DOCUMENTATION, EVEN IF ADVISED OF > THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE. \------------------ I included your suggestions and changed "documentation" to "software" in item 3.) of the conditions list. Better? Regards, Daniel -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]