Message-ID:  <199511151659.LAA01214@aleph.bu.edu>
Reply-To: Mailing list for the LaTeX3 project
              <LATEX-L@VM.URZ.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE>
Date:         Wed, 15 Nov 1995 11:59:54 -0500
From: Matthew Swift <swift@BU.EDU>
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:      distribution conditions on packages and other LaTeX software
Status: R

(I apologize if this message made it to the mailing list a week ago; my
best guess is that it didn't.)

--------
> From: Frank Mittelbach <mittelbach%MZDMZA.ZDV.UNI-MAINZ.DE@BUACCA.BU.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: 4 small packages of basic 2e code made available
> Date:         Thu, 13 Jul 1995 09:43:26 +0200
>
> > Following is a description of the files in this directory.  These
> > bits are, a nd the future package will be, protected by the Gnu
> > Public License, unless someo ne wants to convince me otherwise.
>
> I would like to convince him otherwise. As we explained in the
> document modguide.tex which is part of the LaTeX2e distribution and
> was also send to this list we (the LaTeX3 team) don't think that the
> GPL is appropriate for a document formatting system and document
> exchange format like LaTeX.
>
> As code written under GPL tries to embrace any code that integrates
> it, i don't think i can even look at it let alone integrate any such
> code into LaTeX -- which is unfortunate

I would like to know how to release a package (class, script, etc.)
with distribution conditions most preferable to the LaTeX3 team.

The best would be something written out that I could simply cut and
paste, making the necessary substitutions for names and so on.

There are several kinds of files that need copyright notices, and some
sort of mention of distribution conditions.  They might require
different notices.  These are the ones I can think of:

1) a literate source (e.g., .dtx or noweb source)
2) a code file extracted from (1) (e.g., a .sty file, a shell script)
3) a documentation file extracted from (1) (probably a .dvi file)
4) a standalone file (a style file, shell script, documentation file)
5) a configuration file, which may be modified by the user
6) ?

To make it easier for people to make packages available, I suggest
making this information available in a brief ASCII file in the LaTeX
distribution, along with the basic information about how to submit
something to CTAN.

Thanks,

Matt