X.org licenses

X.org licenses

[Andreas Enge]

I started adding license information to the 184 packages in the X11 
distribution, and did not get very far... There is a list of several very 
similar licenses used, see
   http://www.xfree86.org/current/LICENSE5.html

Number 5.11 is referred to as x11 in license.scm; is it okay to use x11 for 
all others as well?

font-adobe-utopia-* has this strange license:

Permission to use, reproduce, display and distribute the listed typefaces
is hereby granted, provided that the Adobe Copyright notice appears in all
whole and partial copies of the software and that the following trademark
symbol and attribution appear in all unmodified copies of the software:
        Copyright (c) 1989 Adobe Systems Incorporated
        Utopia (R)
        Utopia is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated
The Adobe typefaces (Type 1 font program, bitmaps and Adobe Font Metric
files) donated are:
        Utopia Regular
        Utopia Italic
        Utopia Bold
        Utopia Bold Italic

There is no explicit permission to modify the fonts. On the other hand, the 
sentence speaking of "umodified copies" seems to imply that modified copies 
may also be distributed.

The license of font-bh-* has the same ambiguity as far as modification is 
concerned:

This is the LEGAL NOTICE pertaining to the Lucida fonts from Bigelow & 
Holmes:

	NOTICE TO USER: The source code, including the glyphs or icons 
	forming a par of the OPEN LOOK TM Graphic User Interface, on this 
	tape and in these files is copyrighted under U.S. and international
	laws. Sun Microsystems, Inc. of Mountain View, California owns
	the copyright and has design patents pending on many of the icons. 
	AT&T is the owner of the OPEN LOOK trademark associated with the
	materials on this tape. Users and possessors of this source code 
	are hereby granted a nonexclusive, royalty-free copyright and 
	design patent license to use this code in individual and 
	commercial software. A royalty-free, nonexclusive trademark
	license to refer to the code and output as "OPEN LOOK" compatible 
	is available from AT&T if, and only if, the appearance of the 
	icons or glyphs is not changed in any manner except as absolutely
	necessary to accommodate the standard resolution of the screen or
	other output device, the code and output is not changed except as 
	authorized herein, and the code and output is validated by AT&T. 
	Bigelow & Holmes is the owner of the Lucida (R) trademark for the
	fonts and bit-mapped images associated with the materials on this 
	tape. Users are granted a royalty-free, nonexclusive license to use
	the trademark only to identify the fonts and bit-mapped images if, 
	and only if, the fonts and bit-mapped images are not modified in any
	way by the user. 


	Any use of this source code must include, in the user documentation 
	and internal comments to the code, notices to the end user as  
	follows:


	(c) Copyright 1989 Sun Microsystems, Inc. Sun design patents
	pending in the U.S. and foreign countries. OPEN LOOK is a 
	trademark of AT&T. Used by written permission of the owners.


 	(c) Copyright Bigelow & Holmes 1986, 1985. Lucida is a registered 
	trademark of Bigelow & Holmes. Permission to use the Lucida 
	trademark is hereby granted only in association with the images 
	and fonts described in this file.



	SUN MICROSYSTEMS, INC., AT&T, AND BIGELOW & HOLMES 
	MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS ABOUT THE SUITABILITY OF
 	THIS SOURCE CODE FOR ANY PURPOSE. IT IS PROVIDED "AS IS" 
	WITHOUT EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTY OF ANY KIND. 
	SUN  MICROSYSTEMS, INC., AT&T AND BIGELOW  & HOLMES, 
	SEVERALLY AND INDIVIDUALLY, DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES 
	WITH REGARD TO THIS SOURCE CODE, INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED
	WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A
	PARTICULAR PURPOSE. IN NO EVENT SHALL SUN MICROSYSTEMS,
	INC., AT&T OR BIGELOW & HOLMES BE LIABLE FOR ANY
	SPECIAL, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES,
	OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA 	
	OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF  CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE
	OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION
	WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOURCE CODE.

What do you think? Do trisquel and gnewsense distribute all files from 
x.org?

Andreas

Re: X.org licenses

[Andreas Enge]

Worst of all so far:
font-daewoo-misc has the following COPYING:

"Copyright (c) 1987, 1988 Daewoo Electronics Co.,Ltd."

!!!

Andreas

Re: X.org licenses

[Andreas Enge]

Discouraging comments at
   http://www.x.org/releases/X11R7.7/doc/xorg-docs/License.html :

"Most of these licenses are based on the MIT, X Consortium, or BSD 
(original and revised) licenses. All of them are consistent with the Open 
Source Definition, and most are consistent with the Free Software 
Foundation's Free Software Definition.

While the current licenses are all open source licenses, the X.Org 
Foundation is attempting, over time, to bring as much as possible of the 
code's licenses in the distribution into compliance with the Debian Free 
Software Guidelines."

So some are inconsistent with the FSF definition of a free license. But 
which ones?

Andreas

Re: X.org licenses

[Ludovic Courtès]

Andreas Enge <andreas@enge.fr> skribis:

> I started adding license information to the 184 packages in the X11 
> distribution, and did not get very far... There is a list of several very 
> similar licenses used, see
>    http://www.xfree86.org/current/LICENSE5.html
>
> Number 5.11 is referred to as x11 in license.scm; is it okay to use x11 for 
> all others as well?

I would say so, yes.

> font-adobe-utopia-* has this strange license:
>
> Permission to use, reproduce, display and distribute the listed typefaces
> is hereby granted, provided that the Adobe Copyright notice appears in all
> whole and partial copies of the software and that the following trademark
> symbol and attribution appear in all unmodified copies of the software:
>         Copyright (c) 1989 Adobe Systems Incorporated
>         Utopia (R)
>         Utopia is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporated
> The Adobe typefaces (Type 1 font program, bitmaps and Adobe Font Metric
> files) donated are:
>         Utopia Regular
>         Utopia Italic
>         Utopia Bold
>         Utopia Bold Italic
>
> There is no explicit permission to modify the fonts. On the other hand, the 
> sentence speaking of "umodified copies" seems to imply that modified copies 
> may also be distributed.
>
> The license of font-bh-* has the same ambiguity as far as modification is 
> concerned:
>
> This is the LEGAL NOTICE pertaining to the Lucida fonts from Bigelow & 
> Holmes:

The <http://libreplanet.org/wiki/Software_blacklist> lists Lucida as
non-free, but does not mention the others.  So I guess Utopia is OK, but
Lucida is not.

> Worst of all so far:
> font-daewoo-misc has the following COPYING:
>
> "Copyright (c) 1987, 1988 Daewoo Electronics Co.,Ltd."

If there’s nothing else written, then it’s definitely non-free.

Thanks for the investigation!

Ludo’.

Re: X.org licenses

[Andreas Enge]

Here is what the description of xfonts-scalable in debian says:
 This package is missing three fonts from the X.Org source archives
 because the license terms on the fonts do not meet the Debian Free
 Software Guidelines; they are the Type1 fonts Adobe Utopia, IBM Courier,
 and Bigelow & Holmes (B&H) Luxi.

So I will drop Utopia also and go through all the licenses.

I reserve the right to err, however. For instance, font-bitstream-*dpi 
looks almost x11, except for the three words "and without fee", which make 
them non-free. On the other hand, font-bitstream-type1 has a different 
license, although as far as I can tell, it contains the same typeface in a 
different format...

Andreas

Re: X.org licenses

[Andreas Enge]

Am Dienstag, 26. Februar 2013 schrieb Andreas Enge:
> I reserve the right to err, however. For instance, font-bitstream-*dpi
> looks almost x11, except for the three words "and without fee", which
> make them non-free.

Ah, sorry, we had these before. This is part of the MIT license; I would 
still think it is non-free, but apparently it is generally accepted.

However, "these glyphs are unencumbered" does not qualify as a license, I 
think...

Andreas

Re: X.org licenses

[Ludovic Courtès]

Andreas Enge <andreas@enge.fr> skribis:

> Here is what the description of xfonts-scalable in debian says:
>  This package is missing three fonts from the X.Org source archives
>  because the license terms on the fonts do not meet the Debian Free
>  Software Guidelines; they are the Type1 fonts Adobe Utopia, IBM Courier,
>  and Bigelow & Holmes (B&H) Luxi.
>
> So I will drop Utopia also and go through all the licenses.

OK, sounds reasonable.

Ludo’.