[Build-common-hackers] Re: CDBS documentation

[Marc Dequènes (Duck)]

Coin,

Peter Eisentraut <petere at debian.org> writes:

> Am Dienstag, 9. Mai 2006 11:09 schrieb Marc Dequènes:
>> You even removed completly the inline changelog,
>> without any integration in the Debian changelog, which is obviouly a
>> licence infringement.
>
> I will gladly make any changes in order to resolve license infringements but I 
> don't understand what license condition you are referring to here.

The documentation is released under the GPL and from my understanding
the GPL requires that you keep the previous changelog entries.

I believe changelogs are part of copyright notices, stating who changed
what on which part of the "work", and when. The GPL says in section 1:
  [...] provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on
  each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty;
  keep intact all the notices that refer to this License and to the
  absence of any warranty; [...]
A changelog is then not part of a "work".

Moreover, section 2.a says:
  You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating
  that you changed the files and the date of any change.
meaning that you have to add to all previous "intact" notices which
changes you made. Considering CDBS documentation was at a certain point
meant to be integrated into the CDBS sources, your Debian changelog
entry is OK (while absolutly slapdash job considering the level of
details). You may have merged changelogs, but i really think you do not
have rights to remove previous entries.

-- 
Marc Dequènes (Duck)
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