Artistic 1.0 Removal
Summary
Remove all packages licensed under only the Artistic 1.0 license before Fedora 10.
Owner
- Name: TomCallaway
Current status
- Targeted release: Fedora 10
- Last updated: Mon Sep 15, 2008
- Percentage of completion: 100%
Detailed Description
Fedora has some legacy packages which are only available under the Artistic 1.0 license. This license is not a permitted license in Fedora.
Why?
- The FSF says it isn't free. They say that the text is vague, and that it is open to misinterpretation.
- The perl community (the original authors) agrees with this assessment. They went so far as to rewrite the Artistic license to resolve all the identified problems (see http://www.perlfoundation.org/artistic_license_2_0).
- The OSI has "superseded" the license, recommending strongly that all users move to Artistic 2.0: http://opensource.org/licenses/artistic-license-1.0.php
Over the last year, I've tracked down the upstream copyright holders for the majority of these packages, and was able to successfully relicense most of them.
Benefit to Fedora
Adherence to our licensing policies. Gets Fedora closer to the possibility of a "Free" Spin. Avoids potentially expensive and painful lawsuits.
Scope
The following Fedora packages are currently Artistic 1.0 only:
d4x
| Maintainer | thias |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE I've emailed the upstream authors, last email sent Friday July 11, 2008, no response ever received. |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
perl-Class-Gomor
| Maintainer | sindrepb |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE Corresponded with upstream by email in 2007, upstream uncomfortable with Artistic 2.0, unwilling to relicense "just for Fedora". Emailed again on Friday July 11, 2008 to see if they are more willing now. Upstream replied on Saturday, July 12, 2008 that they have no intention of relicensing. |
| Dependency of | perl-Net-Packet , perl-Net-Write , perl-DBIx-SQLite-Simple , perl-Net-Packet-Target |
perl-DBIx-SQLite-Simple
| Maintainer | sindrepb |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE Corresponded with upstream by email in 2007, upstream uncomfortable with Artistic 2.0, unwilling to relicense "just for Fedora". Emailed again on Friday July 11, 2008 to see if they are more willing now. Upstream replied on Saturday, July 12, 2008 that they have no intention of relicensing. (Same upstream as perl-Class-Gomor) |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
perl-Net-Packet
| Maintainer | sindrepb |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE Corresponded with upstream by email in 2007, upstream uncomfortable with Artistic 2.0, unwilling to relicense "just for Fedora". Emailed again on Friday July 11, 2008 to see if they are more willing now. Upstream replied on Saturday, July 12, 2008 that they have no intention of relicensing. (Same upstream as perl-Class-Gomor) |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
perl-Net-Packet-Target
| Maintainer | sindrepb |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE Corresponded with upstream by email in 2007, upstream uncomfortable with Artistic 2.0, unwilling to relicense "just for Fedora". Emailed again on Friday July 11, 2008 to see if they are more willing now. Upstream replied on Saturday, July 12, 2008 that they have no intention of relicensing. (Same upstream as perl-Class-Gomor) |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
perl-Net-Write
| Maintainer | sindrepb |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE Corresponded with upstream by email in 2007, upstream uncomfortable with Artistic 2.0, unwilling to relicense "just for Fedora". Emailed again on Friday July 11, 2008 to see if they are more willing now. Upstream replied on Saturday, July 12, 2008 that they have no intention of relicensing. (Same upstream as perl-Class-Gomor) |
| Dependency of | perl-Net-Packet |
pgadmin3
| Maintainer | pgadmin3 |
| Status | In 2007, upstream agreed to relicense in principle, most contributors were ok with Artistic 2.0, then thread died off. Code is still under Artistic 1.0. Emailed upstream again on Friday, July 11, 2008 to try to restart the process. Upstream is working with the SFLC to try to relicense (confirmed via email on Sat July 12, 2008). Package blocked in F-10, but likely to be revived at some point in the near future, so not killed off entirely. |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
rman
| Maintainer | jamatos |
| Status | DEAD.PACKAGE I've emailed the upstream authors, last email sent Friday July 11, 2008, no response ever received. May be abandoned, last release in 2006. |
| Dependency of | Nothing |
Test Plan
Realistically, there is no test plan. These packages will be gone from Fedora.
User Experience
Any users expecting these packages to be in Fedora will experience their absense, however, I suspect most of these packages are not widely used.
Dependencies
Package dependencies are described above.
Contingency Plan
We don't pull these items out.
Documentation
No need, aside from the Release Notes.
Release Notes
In accordance with the Fedora Licensing policy, we have removed some packages which were only available under the Artistic 1.0 license. Specifically:
- d4x
- perl-Class-Gomor
- perl-DBIx-SQLite-Simple
- perl-Net-Packet
- perl-Net-Packet-Target
- perl-Net-Write
- pgadmin3
- rman
We no longer permit code in Fedora under the Artistic 1.0 license for a variety of reasons:
- The FSF says it is not a free license. They say that the text is vague, and that it is open to misinterpretation.
- The Perl community agrees with this assessment. They went so far as to rewrite the Artistic license to resolve all the identified problems (see http://www.perlfoundation.org/artistic_license_2_0).
- The OSI has "superseded" the license, recommending strongly that all users move to Artistic 2.0: http://opensource.org/licenses/artistic-license-1.0.php
Fedora has made every effort to track down the upstream copyright holders for these packages, and was either unable to reach them or they were unwilling or unable to relicense.
Please note: Packages which are dual-licensed where one of the licenses is Artistic 1.0 are still permissable in Fedora (as long as the other license is on the "Good Software Licenses" list at: Licensing#Good_Licenses), only packages which are solely licensed under Artistic 1.0 are no longer acceptable.