On 2020-04-23 13:29:54 -0500, Derek Martin wrote: > On Mon, Apr 20, 2020 at 08:09:08PM +0200, ilf wrote: > > I think it's fair to honor Kevin as maintainer more than "others". > > I would propose something along: "Copyright (C) 1996-2016 Michael > > R. Elkins, 20XX to 2020 Kevin J. McCarthy, and others. > > No, it MUST NOT say that. That states that only Michael Elkins > contributed copyrightable work from 1996-2016, which is false, and > contradicts the previous copyright messages. > > It should only update the date. It would be acceptable to add names, > to the list, but... why? If you do, be sure to add mine, OK? =8^) > > [This is why we do not do that.]
BTW, copyright notices do not say who contributed, but who owns the copyright. In particular, even if Michael Elkins did not contributed after 2016, he is still part of the copyright owner in 2020, because the work (this version) still contains code he wrote (and this code has not fallen in the public domain). Also note that year ranges (or list of years) are ambiguous. For instance, this version of Mutt is not the one that was published in 1996. The copyright notice should normally give only the year of the first publication, which will be 2020 for version 1.14. -- Vincent Lefèvre <vinc...@vinc17.net> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/> 100% accessible validated (X)HTML - Blog: <https://www.vinc17.net/blog/> Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / AriC project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)
