gsettings.m4 copyright

gsettings.m4 copyright

[Po Lu]

m4/gsettings.m4 comes from GLib, which is free software under the
LGPLv2.1, but not under copyright of the FSF.

It doesn't seem to have been modified by Emacs either, and it has no
copyright notice on top, so I couldn't determine whether or not it is
licensed under the LGPLv2.1-or-later, or if it's only under the
LGPLv2.1, as in the COPYING file.

Does anyone know what to do in this case?

Thanks.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Po Lu <luangruo@yahoo.com>
> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 18:38:26 +0800
> 
> m4/gsettings.m4 comes from GLib, which is free software under the
> LGPLv2.1, but not under copyright of the FSF.
> 
> It doesn't seem to have been modified by Emacs either, and it has no
> copyright notice on top, so I couldn't determine whether or not it is
> licensed under the LGPLv2.1-or-later, or if it's only under the
> LGPLv2.1, as in the COPYING file.
> 
> Does anyone know what to do in this case?

We should add a standard Emacs copyright notice, I think.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Po Lu]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

>> From: Po Lu <luangruo@yahoo.com>
>> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 18:38:26 +0800
>> 
>> m4/gsettings.m4 comes from GLib, which is free software under the
>> LGPLv2.1, but not under copyright of the FSF.
>> 
>> It doesn't seem to have been modified by Emacs either, and it has no
>> copyright notice on top, so I couldn't determine whether or not it is
>> licensed under the LGPLv2.1-or-later, or if it's only under the
>> LGPLv2.1, as in the COPYING file.
>> 
>> Does anyone know what to do in this case?
>
> We should add a standard Emacs copyright notice, I think.

Is that really allowed?  (Assuming a standard Emacs copyright notice
means FSF copyright)

That file is full of non-trivial code from the GLib project.

Thanks.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Po Lu <luangruo@yahoo.com>
> Cc: emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 20:56:41 +0800
> 
> > We should add a standard Emacs copyright notice, I think.
> 
> Is that really allowed?  (Assuming a standard Emacs copyright notice
> means FSF copyright)
> 
> That file is full of non-trivial code from the GLib project.

You are saying that we cannot include it in Emacs, because whoever
wrote the code didn't contribute it to us?  That's not a copyright
question, that's a completely different (and more serious) issue.

Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
has the copyright to its code?

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Po Lu]

Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> writes:

> You are saying that we cannot include it in Emacs, because whoever
> wrote the code didn't contribute it to us?  That's not a copyright
> question, that's a completely different (and more serious) issue.

Yes, I was.  Thanks.

> Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
> has the copyright to its code?

I'm neither of those, but that file is from glib, in m4macros/

  https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/glib/-/blob/main/m4macros/gsettings.m4

There is no copyright statement in that file, but GLib as a whole,
according to the COPYING file, is under the LGPLv2.1.  (It's part of
GNOME as well, but I don't know if Glib specifically is part of the GNU
project.)  If it's urgent, I can rewrite it tomorrow.

And I'm really sorry I didn't catch that when merging feature/pgtk to
master.

According to the VCS history, the following people wrote the file:

  - Bastien Nocera
  - Allison Karlitskaya
  - Dan Winship
  - Javier Jardón
  - Colin Walters
  - Matthias Clasen
  - Christian Persch
  - Hib Eris
  - Simon McVittie
  - Philip Withnall

I will try to get emails for those people tomorrow.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Yuuki Harano]

On Mon, 03 Jan 2022 15:02:19 +0200,
	Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> wrote:
>> > We should add a standard Emacs copyright notice, I think.
>> 
>> Is that really allowed?  (Assuming a standard Emacs copyright notice
>> means FSF copyright)
>> 
>> That file is full of non-trivial code from the GLib project.
> 
> You are saying that we cannot include it in Emacs, because whoever
> wrote the code didn't contribute it to us?  That's not a copyright
> question, that's a completely different (and more serious) issue.
> 
> Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
> has the copyright to its code?

I copied /usr/share/aclocal/gsettings.m4 in my PC.

-- 
Yuuki Harano

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 22:39:50 +0900 (JST)
> From: Yuuki Harano <masm+emacs@masm11.me>
> Cc: luangruo@yahoo.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> 
> > Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
> > has the copyright to its code?
> 
> I copied /usr/share/aclocal/gsettings.m4 in my PC.

That file is installed when you install Glib, so you basically copied
it from Glib without their permission.

At this point, I think we should consider removing the file and
rewriting the tests it performs in configure.ac, in as different a
form from gsettings.m4 as possible.  Is that feasible?

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 16:29:21 +0200
> From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
> Cc: luangruo@yahoo.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> 
> At this point, I think we should consider removing the file and
> rewriting the tests it performs in configure.ac, in as different a
> form from gsettings.m4 as possible.  Is that feasible?

Actually, that file does little more except rewriting some rules in
Makefile.in, is that so?  If so, can't we do that using the GNU Make
ifdef/ifeq conditionals, like we do with native-compilation specific
fragments?  Then perhaps the configure.ac stuff to support that could
be very small, limited to defining some Make macro.

Does this make sense?

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Yuuki Harano]

On Mon, 03 Jan 2022 17:11:38 +0200,
	Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org> wrote:
>> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 16:29:21 +0200
>> From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>
>> Cc: luangruo@yahoo.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org
>> 
>> At this point, I think we should consider removing the file and
>> rewriting the tests it performs in configure.ac, in as different a
>> form from gsettings.m4 as possible.  Is that feasible?
> 
> Actually, that file does little more except rewriting some rules in
> Makefile.in, is that so?  If so, can't we do that using the GNU Make
> ifdef/ifeq conditionals, like we do with native-compilation specific
> fragments?  Then perhaps the configure.ac stuff to support that could
> be very small, limited to defining some Make macro.
> 
> Does this make sense?

Thank you.
I'll try to do in that way tomorrow.

-- 
Yuuki Harano

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Yuuki Harano]

On Tue, 04 Jan 2022 00:59:33 +0900 (JST),
	Yuuki Harano <masm+emacs@masm11.me> wrote:
>> Actually, that file does little more except rewriting some rules in
>> Makefile.in, is that so?  If so, can't we do that using the GNU Make
>> ifdef/ifeq conditionals, like we do with native-compilation specific
>> fragments?  Then perhaps the configure.ac stuff to support that could
>> be very small, limited to defining some Make macro.
>> 
>> Does this make sense?
> 
> Thank you.
> I'll try to do in that way tomorrow.

I did.

-- 
Yuuki Harano

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> Date: Tue, 04 Jan 2022 17:35:58 +0900 (JST)
> Cc: luangruo@yahoo.com, emacs-devel@gnu.org
> From: Yuuki Harano <masm+emacs@masm11.me>
> 
> 
> On Tue, 04 Jan 2022 00:59:33 +0900 (JST),
> 	Yuuki Harano <masm+emacs@masm11.me> wrote:
> >> Actually, that file does little more except rewriting some rules in
> >> Makefile.in, is that so?  If so, can't we do that using the GNU Make
> >> ifdef/ifeq conditionals, like we do with native-compilation specific
> >> fragments?  Then perhaps the configure.ac stuff to support that could
> >> be very small, limited to defining some Make macro.
> >> 
> >> Does this make sense?
> > 
> > Thank you.
> > I'll try to do in that way tomorrow.
> 
> I did.

Thanks a lot!

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Stefan Monnier]

>> > Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
>> > has the copyright to its code?
>> I copied /usr/share/aclocal/gsettings.m4 in my PC.
> That file is installed when you install Glib, so you basically copied
> it from Glib without their permission.

Since it's under the LGPL we do have their permission.

> At this point, I think we should consider removing the file and
> rewriting the tests it performs in configure.ac, in as different a
> form from gsettings.m4 as possible.  Is that feasible?

Is there a specific problem with the file being LGPL?

IIUC the LGPLv2.1 is compatible with GPLv3 (not sure about GPL>3), so
I don't think we have a license problem right now.  Is the problem
limited to "we don't own its copyright" (i.e. something which we impose
on ourselves and could thus choose to ignore)?


        Stefan

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Stefan Monnier <monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>
> Cc: Yuuki Harano <masm+emacs@masm11.me>,  luangruo@yahoo.com,
>  emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 11:03:13 -0500
> 
> >> > Jeff and Yuuki, would you please tell us how you got this file and who
> >> > has the copyright to its code?
> >> I copied /usr/share/aclocal/gsettings.m4 in my PC.
> > That file is installed when you install Glib, so you basically copied
> > it from Glib without their permission.
> 
> Since it's under the LGPL we do have their permission.

I guess you mean we don't _need_ their permission.

Except that in Emacs (and other projects that care about attribution
and copyright assignments), we do.

> > At this point, I think we should consider removing the file and
> > rewriting the tests it performs in configure.ac, in as different a
> > form from gsettings.m4 as possible.  Is that feasible?
> 
> Is there a specific problem with the file being LGPL?

That's not the problem I'm worried about.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[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. ]]]

  > > That file is full of non-trivial code from the GLib project.

  > You are saying that we cannot include it in Emacs, because whoever
  > wrote the code didn't contribute it to us?  That's not a copyright
  > question, that's a completely different (and more serious) issue.

GNU Project policy is that it's ok to import code from other released
free packages whose licenses are compatible with the license we are
using (which is GPL3-or-later).  The license LGPL-2.1 is compatible,
so we can import this code.

We should make sure it carries the copyright notices and license
notices that it should have.  The fact it was missing those is a
small problem, but we can fix that.

If the whole Glib package carries a copyright notices, copy that one.

If it isn't clear what to do, how about asking its developers what
that should be?

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman (https://stallman.org)
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
> Cc: luangruo@yahoo.com, fejfighter@gmail.com, masm+github@masm11.me,
> 	emacs-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Mon, 03 Jan 2022 18:56:07 -0500
> 
>   > > That file is full of non-trivial code from the GLib project.
> 
>   > You are saying that we cannot include it in Emacs, because whoever
>   > wrote the code didn't contribute it to us?  That's not a copyright
>   > question, that's a completely different (and more serious) issue.
> 
> GNU Project policy is that it's ok to import code from other released
> free packages whose licenses are compatible with the license we are
> using (which is GPL3-or-later).  The license LGPL-2.1 is compatible,
> so we can import this code.
> 
> We should make sure it carries the copyright notices and license
> notices that it should have.  The fact it was missing those is a
> small problem, but we can fix that.
> 
> If the whole Glib package carries a copyright notices, copy that one.
> 
> If it isn't clear what to do, how about asking its developers what
> that should be?

I prefer to implement that differently, since what the file does is
not clean enough for my taste.  If that is possible, it would also
solve this issue.  If it turns out to be harder than I thought, we
will reconsider.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[Stefan Kangas]

Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org> writes:

> GNU Project policy is that it's ok to import code from other released
> free packages whose licenses are compatible with the license we are
> using (which is GPL3-or-later).  The license LGPL-2.1 is compatible,
> so we can import this code.
>
> We should make sure it carries the copyright notices and license
> notices that it should have.  The fact it was missing those is a
> small problem, but we can fix that.

Does this policy apply to importing Emacs Lisp libraries as well?

I assume that the answer is "no", but if so I think it would be useful
to briefly explain why that case should be viewed differently.

Thanks in advance.

Re: gsettings.m4 copyright

[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. ]]]

  > Does this policy apply to importing Emacs Lisp libraries as well?

  > I assume that the answer is "no", but if so I think it would be useful
  > to briefly explain why that case should be viewed differently.

The answer is no.  Here's why the cases are different.

The C libraries I was talking about before are not specifically for
Emacs.  They may be used by many unrelated applications, Emacs being
just one.  We don't consider them _part_ of Emacs, we just distribute
them along with Emacs.

It;s different for Emacs Lisp packages.  If we want a Lisp library
enough to distribute it with Emacs, we want to make it part of Emacs.

-- 
Dr Richard Stallman (https://stallman.org)
Chief GNUisance of the GNU Project (https://gnu.org)
Founder, Free Software Foundation (https://fsf.org)
Internet Hall-of-Famer (https://internethalloffame.org)