Assignment overview (again)

Assignment overview (again)

[Lars Ingebrigtsen]

One of the most irksome tasks when applying patches from others is
finding out whether they've made copyright assignments.  I can either
send them an email asking them ("Yeah, and you've applied thirteen
patches from me from 1997-2014"; I have no memory for these things at
all) or ask somebody else, and that all takes time.

I can't be the only one that has this problem.

Is it totally out of the question to put the assignment list up on the
web somewhere?

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Lars Ingebrigtsen]

Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org> writes:

> Is it totally out of the question to put the assignment list up on the
> web somewhere?

Or a search interface!  Assignments As A Service.

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>
> Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2015 20:31:08 +0100
> 
> One of the most irksome tasks when applying patches from others is
> finding out whether they've made copyright assignments.  I can either
> send them an email asking them ("Yeah, and you've applied thirteen
> patches from me from 1997-2014"; I have no memory for these things at
> all) or ask somebody else, and that all takes time.
> 
> I can't be the only one that has this problem.

You aren't.  If you have an account on fencepost.gnu.org, you can look
them up in the list that is maintained there.

Failing that, ask here, or email me or John privately.

> Is it totally out of the question to put the assignment list up on the
> web somewhere?

I don't think we can, it includes personal details of people,
sometimes details they don't want to publish (like real names of
people who use pseudonyms).

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Lars Ingebrigtsen]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> I can't be the only one that has this problem.
>
> You aren't.  If you have an account on fencepost.gnu.org, you can look
> them up in the list that is maintained there.

I don't think I have...  I had an FSF account back in the 90s, though...

>> Is it totally out of the question to put the assignment list up on the
>> web somewhere?
>
> I don't think we can, it includes personal details of people,
> sometimes details they don't want to publish (like real names of
> people who use pseudonyms).

Hm.  Makes sense.  Perhaps the most efficient thing to do would be for
me to get a fencepost account, then.  How does one go about that?

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>
> Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2015 20:41:37 +0100
> 
> > I don't think we can, it includes personal details of people,
> > sometimes details they don't want to publish (like real names of
> > people who use pseudonyms).
> 
> Hm.  Makes sense.  Perhaps the most efficient thing to do would be for
> me to get a fencepost account, then.  How does one go about that?

It's explained here (together with a couple of other methods of
getting the information);

  https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/html_node/Copyright-Papers.html

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Lars Ingebrigtsen]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

> It's explained here (together with a couple of other methods of
> getting the information);
>
>   https://www.gnu.org/prep/maintain/html_node/Copyright-Papers.html

Ok; I'll get an account...

-- 
(domestic pets only, the antidote for overdose, milk.)
   bloggy blog: http://lars.ingebrigtsen.no

RE: Assignment overview (again)

[Phillip Lord]

That is a reason why the full list cannot go up, not a reason why any list cannot go up.

I think I've seen it suggested before, but there might be an electronic way of achieving this. Like, for example, signing peoples
GPG key with a FSF key. This would let people assert that they have copyright assigned at least.

________________________________________
From: emacs-devel-bounces+phillip.lord=newcastle.ac.uk@gnu.org [emacs-devel-bounces+phillip.lord=newcastle.ac.uk@gnu.org] on behalf of Eli Zaretskii [eliz@gnu.org]
Sent: 24 December 2015 19:37
To: Lars Ingebrigtsen
Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org
Subject: Re: Assignment overview (again)

> From: Lars Ingebrigtsen <larsi@gnus.org>
> Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2015 20:31:08 +0100
>
> One of the most irksome tasks when applying patches from others is
> finding out whether they've made copyright assignments.  I can either
> send them an email asking them ("Yeah, and you've applied thirteen
> patches from me from 1997-2014"; I have no memory for these things at
> all) or ask somebody else, and that all takes time.
>
> I can't be the only one that has this problem.

You aren't.  If you have an account on fencepost.gnu.org, you can look
them up in the list that is maintained there.

Failing that, ask here, or email me or John privately.

> Is it totally out of the question to put the assignment list up on the
> web somewhere?

I don't think we can, it includes personal details of people,
sometimes details they don't want to publish (like real names of
people who use pseudonyms).

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Phillip Lord <phillip.lord@newcastle.ac.uk>
> CC: "emacs-devel@gnu.org" <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
> Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2015 21:40:42 +0000
> 
> That is a reason why the full list cannot go up, not a reason why any list cannot go up.

What do you mean by "any list"?  There are other private details
there, how can we know who and why wouldn't want that to be public
knowledge?

> I think I've seen it suggested before, but there might be an electronic way of achieving this. Like, for example, signing peoples
> GPG key with a FSF key. This would let people assert that they have copyright assigned at least.

Feel free to talk with the FSF about that.  Setting up some server
that could be securely queried sounds to me like the best idea and
easiest on users.  But any other solution is also fine.

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Phillip Lord]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> From: Phillip Lord <phillip.lord@newcastle.ac.uk>
>> CC: "emacs-devel@gnu.org" <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
>> Date: Thu, 24 Dec 2015 21:40:42 +0000
>> 
>> That is a reason why the full list cannot go up, not a reason why any list cannot go up.
>
> What do you mean by "any list"?  There are other private details
> there, how can we know who and why wouldn't want that to be public
> knowledge?

We ask them.

It's like the UK electoral register. There's the real one (i.e. who can
vote) and the public one (i.e. the subset of the real one that has not
withdrawn itself from the public one).

So, the FSF could ask at time of copyright assignment papers which
details people are happy with being public.

Phil

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: phillip.lord@russet.org.uk (Phillip Lord)
> Cc: <larsi@gnus.org>,  <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
> Date: Thu, 07 Jan 2016 00:16:32 +0000
> 
> > What do you mean by "any list"?  There are other private details
> > there, how can we know who and why wouldn't want that to be public
> > knowledge?
> 
> We ask them.
> 
> It's like the UK electoral register. There's the real one (i.e. who can
> vote) and the public one (i.e. the subset of the real one that has not
> withdrawn itself from the public one).
> 
> So, the FSF could ask at time of copyright assignment papers which
> details people are happy with being public.

Feel free to suggest that to the FSF staff.  We don't manage this,
none of us.

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Richard Stallman]

[[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
[[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
[[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]

  > > So, the FSF could ask at time of copyright assignment papers which
  > > details people are happy with being public.

In principle, I see nothing wrong with this.  But I don't want to ask
our staff to do this extra work.  They are supposed to notify the
contributor immediately when they record the signed papers, and the
contributor can report this immediately if he wants to.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman
President, Free Software Foundation (gnu.org, fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (internethalloffame.org)
Skype: No way! See stallman.org/skype.html.

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Phillip Lord]

Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> writes:

> [[[ To any NSA and FBI agents reading my email: please consider    ]]]
> [[[ whether defending the US Constitution against all enemies,     ]]]
> [[[ foreign or domestic, requires you to follow Snowden's example. ]]]
>
>   > > So, the FSF could ask at time of copyright assignment papers which
>   > > details people are happy with being public.
>
> In principle, I see nothing wrong with this.  But I don't want to ask
> our staff to do this extra work.  They are supposed to notify the
> contributor immediately when they record the signed papers, and the
> contributor can report this immediately if he wants to.

Sure, but at the moment, for example, if I want to bring a package into
Emacs I have to contact all contributors, to check whether they have
assignments. This can be cut down by checking which contributions are
trivial, or no longer in the code base, but it's still creates a lot of
noise.

And I have no ability to check whether the contributors are actually
correct in what they say (i.e. their employer disclaimer may have run
out).

So, to check these things, I have to mail assign@gnu. For dash.el, this
involved talking to around 10 people. Other packages have many more (151
for cider for instance).

My question. Are you sure this is extra work for FSF staff? It might be
less.

Phil

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Jose E. Marchesi]

    
    Sure, but at the moment, for example, if I want to bring a package into
    Emacs I have to contact all contributors, to check whether they have
    assignments.

Just request a shell account in fencepost.gnu.org [1].  Once you have
access you will be able to check that information by yourself, without
having to contact anyone.

[1] http://www.gnu.org/software/README.accounts.html

Re: Assignment overview (again)

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: phillip.lord@russet.org.uk (Phillip Lord)
> Cc: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>,  <larsi@gnus.org>,  <emacs-devel@gnu.org>
> Date: Fri, 08 Jan 2016 13:48:16 +0000
> 
> So, to check these things, I have to mail assign@gnu. For dash.el, this
> involved talking to around 10 people. Other packages have many more (151
> for cider for instance).

As I already said here, you can always ask on this list, or on
bug-gnu-emacs.