Re: legal status of progmodes/sym-comp.el

[Dave Love <fx@gnu.org>]

Chong Yidong <cyd@stupidchicken.com> writes:

>> Dave Love's latest version of python.el requires his sym-comp library.
>> This is now installed as lisp/progmodes/sym-comp.el.
>> It is "Copyright (C) 2004  Dave Love".

That's obviously an error -- since it contains code from lisp.el --
probably due to Emacs regressions breaking my context-dependent
settings, which I didn't spot in that case.  I'll fix the notice when I
get a chance.

>> As far as I know, he has expressed no interest in contributing this to
>> Emacs, so I don't see that we can just take it and make it copyright
>> FSF.

Obviously it was meant to be in Emacs.  It would have been, with other
abstractions, if I'd got round to it when I was a maintainer.  However
it was rejected previously and expurgated from python.el.  There's no
point in using it just for Python.

>> I mean, I have a blanket past and future Emacs copyright assignment,
>> but that doesn't mean you can take any elisp code I happen to put on a
>> website and make it copyright FSF - only those things I explicitly
>> contribute.

Indeed, in general, but that was a mistake.  You can use the sym-comp
code if it's now acceptable for some reason.

It would be better if contributions weren't rejected and then either
used or reimplemented by someone else years later, or broken randomly,
or just left to linger in CVS for years without even accepting bug
reports/fixes from people who wrote them.