notion-devel

[Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[<no...@di...>]

Hi all.

Can we talk about what keeps notion in non-free? Section 4 of the DFSG
at

 http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines

explicitly allows restrictions on the project name.

The Debian bug that talks about this at

 http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=544848

ementions that Tuomo had issues not only with the name of the project,
but also with the name of the source and configuration files. Would we
consider ranaming all ion* to notion*? If that's the only hurdle, it
sounds well worth it to me.

dima

Re: [Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Arnout E. <no...@bz...>]

On Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 10:06 AM, <no...@di...> wrote:

> Can we talk about what keeps notion in non-free? Section 4 of the DFSG at
>
>  http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
>
> explicitly allows restrictions on the project name.
>

I would love that to happen.

The Debian bug that talks about this at
>
>  http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=544848
>
> mentions that Tuomo had issues not only with the name of the project,
> but also with the name of the source and configuration files.


I seem to remember that I've brought this up on debian-legal more recently,
but can't find the thread right now. Will search more later.

Would we consider renaming all ion* to notion*? If that's the only hurdle,
> it sounds well worth it to me.
>

That would not do anything to side-step the hurdle as described by Ben in
that message: the problem is not that Notion would violate the license, but
that the license is too restrictive. Changes to Notion itself won't help,
because whatever we change doesn't make the license more or less
restrictive.

There is, however, also good news: as far as I can see, the things that are
considered 'too restrictive' are not in the license itself, but in
claims/interpretations/expressed 'intentions' by Tuomo. Basically those are
irrelevant: what's relevant is what's actually in the license, not what has
been said about it after the fact.

You could make the case that any proclaimed restrictions that go beyond
what's allowed by the DFSG aren't in fact in the license, but are
unreasonably broad interpretations of the license. I think that's a
reasonable position, and then Notion can be considered DFSG-free.

I've updated
https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/notion/index.php?title=Licensing_FAQ for
a little bit.


Kind regards,

Arnout

Re: [Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Jeff B. <jef...@gm...>]

>
>
> There is, however, also good news: as far as I can see, the things that
> are considered 'too restrictive' are not in the license itself, but in
> claims/interpretations/expressed 'intentions' by Tuomo. Basically those are
> irrelevant: what's relevant is what's actually in the license, not what has
> been said about it after the fact.
>
>
With the exception that he agrees that the name Notion does not violate the
license. That bit is relevant. :)

I'm still waiting for a response from RedHat Legal re: Fedora. Their
response may help convince the Debian team.


> I've updated
> https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/notion/index.php?title=Licensing_FAQ for
> a little bit.
>
> Hmm - I can't seem to access the wiki anymore. Clicking on the above link
prompts me to log in and clicking on the link on the home page takes me to
a blank page. Hopefully it's just a burp on SourceForge's end.

Regards,
Jeff

-- 
Jeff Backus
jef...@gm...
http://github.com/jsbackus

Re: [Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Arnout E. <no...@bz...>]

On Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 1:39 PM, Jeff Backus <jef...@gm...> wrote:

>
>> There is, however, also good news: as far as I can see, the things that
>> are considered 'too restrictive' are not in the license itself, but in
>> claims/interpretations/expressed 'intentions' by Tuomo. Basically those are
>> irrelevant: what's relevant is what's actually in the license, not what has
>> been said about it after the fact.
>>
>>
> With the exception that he agrees that the name Notion does not violate
> the license. That bit is relevant. :)
>

Well, sure, but not to the question whether or not the license is DFSG-free.

I'm still waiting for a response from RedHat Legal re: Fedora. Their
> response may help convince the Debian team.
>

Looking forward to it!


> I've updated
>> https://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/notion/index.php?title=Licensing_FAQ for
>> a little bit.
>>
>> Hmm - I can't seem to access the wiki anymore. Clicking on the above link
> prompts me to log in and clicking on the link on the home page takes me to
> a blank page. Hopefully it's just a burp on SourceForge's end.
>

Producing blank pages for me now... looks like something on their end
indeed.


Arnout

Re: [Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Dima K. <no...@di...>]

no...@bz... writes:

> On Thu, Jan 16, 2014 at 1:39 PM, Jeff Backus <jef...@gm...> wrote:
>
>>
>>> There is, however, also good news: as far as I can see, the things that
>>> are considered 'too restrictive' are not in the license itself, but in
>>> claims/interpretations/expressed 'intentions' by Tuomo. Basically those are
>>> irrelevant: what's relevant is what's actually in the license, not what has
>>> been said about it after the fact.
>>>
>>>
>> With the exception that he agrees that the name Notion does not violate
>> the license. That bit is relevant. :)
>>
>
> Well, sure, but not to the question whether or not the license is DFSG-free.
>
> I'm still waiting for a response from RedHat Legal re: Fedora. Their
>> response may help convince the Debian team.
>>
>
> Looking forward to it!

Hi.

First off, in 2009 Tuomo updated the license, removing the 28-day
clause. Notion's LICENSE file did not have this change. I'm attaching a
patch with the update. The mailing list post is

 https://lists.berlios.de/pipermail/ion-general/2009-September/001730.html[1]


Second, I re-read Ben Hutchings's post at

 http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=544848#20[2]

and I now understand what you are saying, Arnout. The DFSG allows
licenses to dictate the naming of projects, but NOT names of source
files, configuration files, etc. So if notion's license dictates more
than just the project name, the DFSG is not satisfied. Notion's license
states

  If the name Ion(tm) or other names that can be associated with the Ion
  project are used to distribute this software, then ...

    < stuff we do not want to do >

  Versions for which the above conditions are not satisfied, must be
  renamed so that they can not be associated with the Ion project, their
  executables must be given names that do not conflict with the copyright
  holder's version, and neither the copyright holder nor the Ion project
  may be referred to for support.


This text clearly states that if 'Ion(tm)' can be associated with the
software, then the software must be renamed (i.e. an association comes
from the name). I think a strong case can be made that this is
DFSG-compliant. Ben's personal communication with Tuomo seems to
indicate a stronger condition than the text, but the text is what
defines the license, as you say. When did you bring this up with
debian-legal? Possibly we should bring this up again. I can do this, if
you like. Doing lots of debian things these days...


dima

Re: [Notion-devel] Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Dima K. <no...@di...>]

no...@di... writes:

> I'm attaching a patch with the update

Oops. Forgot the patch.

[Notion-devel] Fwd: Getting notion out of Debian/non-free

[Arnout E. <no...@bz...>]

On Sat, Jan 18, 2014 at 11:17 AM, Dima Kogan <no...@di...>wrote:

> First off, in 2009 Tuomo updated the license, removing the 28-day
>  clause. Notion's LICENSE file did not have this change. I'm attaching a
> patch with the update. The mailing list post is
>
>
> https://lists.berlios.de/pipermail/ion-general/2009-September/001730.html[1]
>

Interesting, thanks for the heads-up.

Generally it is of course very strange to 'patch in' a license change into
a software - normally you can't legally do that. However in this case Tuomo
clearly expresses his intent and GPG-signed the updated license, to it
seems justified here. Unless someone objects, I'll probably apply the patch.



> [[the Ion license]] clearly states that if 'Ion(tm)' can be associated
> with the
>
> software, then the software must be renamed (i.e. an association comes
> from the name). I think a strong case can be made that this is
> DFSG-compliant. Ben's personal communication with Tuomo seems to
> indicate a stronger condition than the text, but the text is what
> defines the license, as you say.
>

Exactly, good summary.


> When did you bring this up with debian-legal? Possibly we should bring
> this up again. I can do this, if you like. Doing lots of debian things
> these days...


I'll try and look it up.


Arnout