[Pkg-octave-devel] Bug#435214: Bug#435214: Clarification of licensing terms of semidef-oct

[Rafael Laboissiere]

I am one of the members of the Debian Octave Group [1], which maintains the
Octave-related packages for the Debian GNU/Linux distribution.  Your
semidef_prog software, which was ported to Octave by A. S. Hodel, has been
packaged for Debian [2] since 1998.

Only recently, it has been brought to our attention [3] the fact that the
license terms in the semidef_prog's README file are incompatible with the 
Debian Free Software Guidelines [4].  At least, the phrase "distribute this
software for any purpose without fee" is ambiguous.

Unless the license terms are clarified or they are switched to some standard
license language (like MIT/X11 or GPL), we will be forced to removed the
package from Debian, which would be a pity for our users.

Just FYI, the semidef_prog software seem sto work correctly with the latest
version of Octave (2.9.13).

[1] http://pkg-octave.alioth.debian.org/
[2] http://packages.debian.org/unstable/math/octave-sp
[3] http://bugs.debian.org/435214
[4] http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines

(Please, respect the Reply-To header, in order to keep the discussion
recorded in our Bug Tracking System.  Thanks.)

Best regards,

-- 
Rafael Laboissiere