From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Eli Zaretskii Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: Documenting FSF copyright assignment process Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 16:51:43 +0300 Message-ID: <837ec0645s.fsf@gnu.org> References: <1554939201.27299.0@yandex.ru> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Injection-Info: blaine.gmane.org; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:195.159.176.226"; logging-data="51875"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@blaine.gmane.org" Cc: rms@gnu.org, emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Konstantin Kharlamov Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Thu Apr 11 15:52:29 2019 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtps (TLS1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.89) (envelope-from ) id 1hEa7u-000DJr-1k for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 11 Apr 2019 15:52:26 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:49264 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hEa7t-0007lI-2W for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Thu, 11 Apr 2019 09:52:25 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([209.51.188.92]:50783) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hEa7f-0007kV-TG for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Thu, 11 Apr 2019 09:52:14 -0400 Original-Received: from fencepost.gnu.org ([2001:470:142:3::e]:55556) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hEa7f-0003gn-Dr; Thu, 11 Apr 2019 09:52:11 -0400 Original-Received: from [176.228.60.248] (port=4921 helo=home-c4e4a596f7) by fencepost.gnu.org with esmtpsa (TLS1.2:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.82) (envelope-from ) id 1hEa7X-00017h-UP; Thu, 11 Apr 2019 09:52:04 -0400 In-reply-to: <1554939201.27299.0@yandex.ru> (message from Konstantin Kharlamov on Thu, 11 Apr 2019 02:33:21 +0300) X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 2.2.x-3.x [generic] X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:235283 Archived-At: > Date: Thu, 11 Apr 2019 02:33:21 +0300 > From: Konstantin Kharlamov > Cc: Richard Stallman > > I recently went through the signing procedure, and one thing I didn't > like which can be improved: the specific steps up to sending a mail to > assign@gnu.org are not documented. In my case I had to send a private > mail to Eli asking for the assignment form, he sent it back to me along > with further instructions; then I filled the form and sent it to > assign@gnu.org. > > This is a roundtrip that takes time for both maintainer and a user. Don't worry about the maintainer's time. It took me all of 10 sec to respond with the form and the instructions for filling it. > Additionally, users are not even sure if what they're doing is correct, > e.g. look at the last "assignment"-titled mail on this list, it starts > with "I'm not sure if it's the right place to ask this". Yes, neither > was I! The only way I can understand this particular aspect of the issue is by assuming that people don't read the section in the Emacs manual where this is described, the one you quoted in your email, because that section explicitly tells to ask on emacs-devel. I can understand why this could happen: our user manual, being such a large document, it is not the best place to include this information and hope that it will be easily discoverable there. So I've included that information near the beginning of CONTRIBUTE, which is about the first document potential contributors should read before sending patches. > It would really help if the emacs documentation about assignment¹ has > either α) a paragraph with the form to be sent to assign@gnu.org and > according instructions, or β) if it has to be documented on another > site, e.g. FSF's, it would help to put a link to emacs documentation¹ > after the words "Copyright assignment is a simple process." (and I hope > that this would-be referred documentation includes α; preferrably with > any legal notes — if there will be any — moved somewhere at the > bottom). If the FSF places the forms on some official site, and accompany them with the necessary instructions about how to choose the correct one (yes, there's more than one form), then I agree that we should reference that place in our docs. But I don't think it's right for us to include the assignment form(s) in our docs, because we are not the source of the document, and don't really have to understand all the intricacies of the process, starting with how to choose the correct form for each case. (Gnulib does include the forms in its repository, but I don't think this is TRT for any GNU project to do that.) I think having the information in CONTRIBUTE will make it much more discoverable. As for the time it takes to ask for the form and send it in response, I don't see that as a significant issue.