On Wed, Apr 29, 2026 at 11:38:49AM +0200, Simon Josefsson wrote: > Is there objections to using SPDX abbreviations for the file names of > licenses in base-files? > > I didn't double-check if that's in the proposal, but I think that's how > it should be done. > > If we already deviate from SPDX names, then maybe moving existing files > to SPDX-names, and recommending use of those names, and set up a symlink > would be an improvement. Or grandfather in them as exceptions, to avoid > unnecessary debian/copyright churn. > > It would be nice if SPDX names was mentioned in debian-policy or > base-files/debian/README.source, so we don't forget about this aspect in > the future. We can always change that policy later on if it turns out > to be a bad idea for some reason (if someone registers FOO`rm -rf /` as > a SPDX license name, perhaps).
More generally we could have two packages: base-files with /usr/share/common-licenses/ and a new package spdx-license with /usr/share/spdx-licenses/ with all SPDX license used by Debian. and have a tool that build debian/copyright from spdx-license at build time, so spdx-license would only be needed when building packages. Cheers, -- Bill. <[email protected]> Imagine a large red swirl here.
