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 (message from David Carlisle on Tue, 18 Jul 1995 14:34:45 BST)
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Date: Wed, 19 Jul 1995 09:47:34 -0300 (BST)
From: David Carlisle <carlisle@CS.MAN.AC.UK>
Sender: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
To: Multiple recipients of list LATEX-L <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
Subject: Re: latex/1600: LaTeX2e licensing terms
Status: R

I replied yesterday  to a message of Richard Stallman's but it turns
out that listserv rejected his message as he is not on the list so
Richard asked me to forward his message...

===========================================


The explicit description of the file types is a big improvement.
I have these comments about the change.

1. Some of the things you say about "copyright" or "copyright notice"
make no sense--you must be talking about something else, such as the
copying conditions or the notice of copying conditions.

A copyright is an abstract legal entity.  It either exists for a given
work or it doesn't; there aren't any other degrees of freedom.  A
copyright notice says "Copyright YEAR NAME" and nothing more.

A file like legal.txt does not contain a copyright; it contains a
statement of conditions for copying and modification.  It cannot
possibly be overridden by the copyright of an individual file, but
could be overridden by the copying conditions of that file.

I've reported this problem before--would you please fix it, so I don't
feel my efforts to help are being ignored?

2. Regarding this paragraph:

     * It is allowed only if the copyright notice in the file does not
       expressly forbid it.

If the section below "COPYRIGHT ON INDIVIDUAL FILES" is intended to
restate this in more detail, please say so explicitly, like this:

     * It is allowed only if the stated conditions in the file do not
       expressly forbid it.  See below, under "TERMS FOR INDIVIDUAL FILES",
       for a complete list of classes of files which are exceptions.

I think that is the intention, but the fact that it isn't stated
explicitly here suggests that maybe that isn't the intention.  People
will not feel confident they understand properly.

3. Some of this is unclear:

       * Files with extension `.fd'.
         The modification restrictions on these files are relaxed.
         Under certain conditions it is allowed to modify the file without
         changing the name. See the head of any of the .fd files for
         details also the documentation in cfgguide.tex has information
         on when it makes sense to modify or generate such files.

       * Files with extension `.cfg'.
         These files may be edited. The documentation in cfgguide.tex has
         information on when it makes sense to modify or generate such
         files.

a. Does cfgguide.tex contain legal conditions, or advice?  It is not
really clear from this wording; mentioning the file right next to a
statement about legal terms suggests that it states legal terms too,
and people will wonder what they are.

If the file contains advice, please delete all mention of it from
here, and mention it at the end of the section instead.  Say this:

  You can find advice about when it is useful to modify or generate
  .fd or .cfg files in the file cfgguide.tex.

That avoids uncertainty.

b. "These files may be edited" is not quite clear.  Does it mean, "You
have permission to modify these files as you wish as long as you
preserve the copyright notice and permission notice"?  If so, please
say that, to be more concrete.

c. "The modification restrictions on these files are relaxed" is not
specific.  It says that the conditions for modifying these files are
more lax, but it doesn't say precisely what they are.  Would you
please be specific?