Bug#665334: [Pkg-fonts-devel] Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge (currently August 2014)
Daniel Kahn Gillmor writes:
> Hi Vasudev--
>
> On Sat 2016-07-30 03:17:01 -0400, Vasudev Kamath wrote:
>
>> Do you still find this problem in latest fontforge in Debian
>> experimental?.. I did a quick search in fontforge/othersubrs.c file I
>> did not find exact license text you posted.
>
> I don't see that license text either, but there are several weird
> references to adobe in fontforge/othersubrs.c which i don't really know
> how to interpret clearly.
Same here.
>
>> Since I became the new maintainer of fontforge, this bug popped up on my
>> Maintainer Dashboard :-). So wondering if this issue still affects
>> fontforge or not.
>
> well, the specific text i pointed out as problematic is gone. But there
> are still provocative statements like:
>
> These subroutines are code by Adobe for this exact use (from
> T1_Spec.pdf)
>
>
> or:
>
> static const char *copyright[] = {
> "% Copyright (c) 1987-1990 Adobe Systems Incorporated.",
> "% All Rights Reserved.",
> "% This code to be used for Flex and hint replacement.",
> "% Version 1.1",
> NULL
> };
>
>
> but i confess i've lost track of how to interpret them, sorry :(
Yeah I noticed them.
Hello fellow fonts team members :-). Do you guys have some suggestion here?.
Bug#665334: [Pkg-fonts-devel] Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge (currently August 2014)
Hi Vasudev--
On Sat 2016-07-30 03:17:01 -0400, Vasudev Kamath wrote:
> Do you still find this problem in latest fontforge in Debian
> experimental?.. I did a quick search in fontforge/othersubrs.c file I
> did not find exact license text you posted.
I don't see that license text either, but there are several weird
references to adobe in fontforge/othersubrs.c which i don't really know
how to interpret clearly.
> Since I became the new maintainer of fontforge, this bug popped up on my
> Maintainer Dashboard :-). So wondering if this issue still affects
> fontforge or not.
well, the specific text i pointed out as problematic is gone. But there
are still provocative statements like:
These subroutines are code by Adobe for this exact use (from
T1_Spec.pdf)
or:
static const char *copyright[] = {
"% Copyright (c) 1987-1990 Adobe Systems Incorporated.",
"% All Rights Reserved.",
"% This code to be used for Flex and hint replacement.",
"% Version 1.1",
NULL
};
but i confess i've lost track of how to interpret them, sorry :(
--dkg
Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge (currently August 2014)
Hi Dkg, Do you still find this problem in latest fontforge in Debian experimental?.. I did a quick search in fontforge/othersubrs.c file I did not find exact license text you posted. Since I became the new maintainer of fontforge, this bug popped up on my Maintainer Dashboard :-). So wondering if this issue still affects fontforge or not. Cheers, vasudev
Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge
Hi, >The originals of several of these functions seem to appear (with >non-DFSG-free licensing) in the appendices of >http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/en/font/5015.Type1_Supp.pdf > >In particular, the licensing says: > >>>> This code, as well as the code in the following appendices, is copyrighted >>>> by >>>> Adobe Systems Incorporated, and may not be reproduced except by >>>> permission of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Adobe Systems Incorporated >>>> grants permission to use this code in Type 1 font programs, as long as the >>>> code is used as it appears in this document, the copyright notice remains >>>> intact, and the character outline code included in such a font program is >>>> neither copied nor derived from character outline code in any Adobe Systems >>>> font program. >> https://github.com/fontforge/fontforge/blob/master/fontforge/othersubrs.c This code seems to be based on https://github.com/adobe-type-tools/afdko/tree/master/FDK/Tools/Programs/public/lib/source/t1write/t1write_flexothers.* and now Adobe Font Development Kit for OpenType (AFDKO) is licensed under Apache-2.0 license. Fontforge is licensed under GPL-3, so it's not a problem to embedded it. Thanks, Read and other folks in Adobe :) Bug#665334 "non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge" is solved. However, I don't know it is okay for other pfb files with license conflicts. Apache-2.0 conflicts with GPL-2, at least, and it may conflict with other license, too. Just "type 1 fonts include Adobe all right reserved code" is not a problem, but if those type 1 fonts would be licensed under certain license like GPL-2 that conflict with Apache-2.0...? And, how can I think about fontforge copies snippet to generate those *.pfb files? It's for Bug#694308.
Bug#665334: [Pkg-fonts-devel] Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge #665334
Hi Read-- Thanks for the thoughtful and helpful followup! Comments below: On 09/04/2012 11:33 AM, Read Roberts wrote: > Given enough time, Adobe could publish the MM othersubr code under an > OpenSource license. However, although the Adobe Type Dept could request > this pretty quickly, it would take many months to actually happen - the this > will sit at the bottom of the legal groups's priority list for a long time. Even if it takes a long time, this would be great. If you're part of the Adobe Type Dept, could you make the request internally and let us know what its status is? Even if it takes a long time, it would be nice to have that licensing change done (and maybe it would encourage adobe to publish its examples with more liberal licenses going forward as well). > I am not familiar with the context for this thread. You can read the background here: http://bugs.debian.org/665334 -- feel free to ask questions if parts of the discussion aren't clear. > However, it seems to me that the font forge code could simply be eliminated. > This MM subrs in question is needed only for making new MM Type1 fonts, which > is a bad idea. The MM format is not supported in OpenType, and over time, > support for authoring with plain Type 1 fonts is getting steadily sketchier. > Of course, MM Type1 fonts in existing documents will need to be supported > indefintely – PDF's and fonts are forever. we're leaning roughly in this direction, as described in http://bugs.debian.org/665334 . But as you say, these things are "forever", and we'd like to enable people to build old fonts cleanly on new systems if they find they need them for whatever reason. Regards, --dkg signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge #665334
Given enough time, Adobe could publish the MM othersubr code under an OpenSource license. However, although the Adobe Type Dept could request this pretty quickly, it would take many months to actually happen - the this will sit at the bottom of the legal groups's priority list for a long time. I am not familiar with the context for this thread. However, it seems to me that the font forge code could simply be eliminated. This MM subrs in question is needed only for making new MM Type1 fonts, which is a bad idea. The MM format is not supported in OpenType, and over time, support for authoring with plain Type 1 fonts is getting steadily sketchier. Of course, MM Type1 fonts in existing documents will need to be supported indefintely – PDF's and fonts are forever. - Read Roberts Adopbe Type Dept
Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge
On 07/13/2012 11:34 AM, Hideki Yamane wrote: >> We could probably make a new dfsg-free "clean" upstream tarball that is >> still capable of building fontforge binaries by ripping out big chunks >> of this file (i haven't tried it yet), but i don't know what that would >> do to fontforge's ability to do Type1 font generation. >> >> Another approach would be to move fontforge from the main archive to the >> non-free archive; but it seems like that would relegate many of our font >> packages to contrib, due to build-dependencies. :( >> >> I'm open to other suggestions; i would be overjoyed, in fact, to hear >> other suggestions. Does anyone have any proposals? > > Have you asked to upstream to change its license to DFSG-free one? > Nowadays Adobe seems to be a little bit friendly to opensource. > It's best choice if we can have it. john knightley (cc'ed here) had offered to try to contact folks at adobe back in March, but i don't know if he did that (or if he received the support he wanted from the group for doing that). john, did you speak with anyone? Do you need anything else from us to move this forward? IIRC, the issue is: 0) Adobe offered postscript code (the "makeblendedfont" function from Adobe's Technical Specification #5015) under a license that does not allow modification, or reuse outside of a very specific purpose. Additionally, the "OtherSubrs" function from Example 1 in Adobe's Technical Specification #5014, doesn't appear to have any specific license granted for reuse. 1) fontforge embeds these two pieces of postscript in its source, and replicates them into its output when it creates certain kinds of font files. This situation does not satisfy the debian free software guidelines because of the restrictions on modification and constraint on field of endeavor. If Adobe was willing to release these two functions under a more liberal license (e.g. the BSD or MIT license) that would be a wonderful contribution to the community. Regards, --dkg signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature
Bug#665334: non-DFSG postscript embedded in fontforge
Package: fontforge Severity: serious On 03/03/2012 07:48 AM, Nicholas Bamber wrote: > We have a package libimager-perl where we have had to remove a few > adobe-related test files as being non-DFSG. See > http://cpansearch.perl.org/src/TONYC/Imager-0.88/adobe.txt . > > However given a comment in the latest version's changelog: > > " - note that the generator of the apparently non-DFSG-free postscript > in MMOne.pfb is a Debian package." > > by which he means fontforge. I intend to email to the author and assure > him that this is a purely precautionary measure on our part and that the > functionality of the package is not inhibited. > > However since fontforge has been roped into the issue I wonder what you > guys think. Hi Nicholas-- Thank you for raising this issue. I just did a bit of research to try to figure out what this is about. In fontforge, it appears that this code is embedded in fontforge/othersubrs.c The originals of several of these functions seem to appear (with non-DFSG-free licensing) in the appendices of http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/en/font/5015.Type1_Supp.pdf In particular, the licensing says: >>> This code, as well as the code in the following appendices, is copyrighted >>> by >>> Adobe Systems Incorporated, and may not be reproduced except by >>> permission of Adobe Systems Incorporated. Adobe Systems Incorporated >>> grants permission to use this code in Type 1 font programs, as long as the >>> code is used as it appears in this document, the copyright notice remains >>> intact, and the character outline code included in such a font program is >>> neither copied nor derived from character outline code in any Adobe Systems >>> font program. This license looks pretty non-DFSG-free to me, and it applies at least to the makeblendedfont array in fontforge/othersubrs.c. Even more depressing, the makeblendedfont array in othersubrs.c actually has a modified comment (correcting a mistakenly copy/pasted buggy comment from the code in the PDF!) which potentially means that it is itself in violation of Adobe's restrictive license. I'm not really sure what to do about this other than to open an RC bug against fontforge, which this e-mail should do :( We could probably make a new dfsg-free "clean" upstream tarball that is still capable of building fontforge binaries by ripping out big chunks of this file (i haven't tried it yet), but i don't know what that would do to fontforge's ability to do Type1 font generation. Another approach would be to move fontforge from the main archive to the non-free archive; but it seems like that would relegate many of our font packages to contrib, due to build-dependencies. :( I'm open to other suggestions; i would be overjoyed, in fact, to hear other suggestions. Does anyone have any proposals? --dkg -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-rc-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org
