public inbox for gcc@gcc.gnu.org
 help / color / mirror / Atom feed
* Re: Manual contributions and copyright assignments
@ 2003-05-23 18:22 Nathanael Nerode
  0 siblings, 0 replies; 4+ messages in thread
From: Nathanael Nerode @ 2003-05-23 18:22 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: gcc, pfeifer; +Cc: rms

Gerald wrote:
>RMS asked us to implement the following policy:
>
>  [P]lease don't install changes in the manual on the strength
>  of copyright assignments signed before Jan 2002.  If a person 
>signed
>  before that, assign@gnu.org can look at the papers and tell you 
>if
>  they explicitly cover documentation.  If not, we should get new 
>papers
>  from that contributor.
>
>As far as I understand, obvious fixes and minor changes (where we 
>didn't
>need a copyright assignment before) are not affected.

Let me state for the record that I consider all my changes to the manual 
to date to be uncopyrightable.  So at least you don't have to worry 
about me for the past.

>RMS, how do you suggest to proceed practically?  This seems to 
>affect more
>than 100 developers with CVS write access, any of which can commit 
>patches
>of her/his own or others, and about 700 contributors overall 
>(according to
>/gd/gnuorg/copyright.list).

For the *future* there's no real problem; there's just a major 
annoyance. Someone has to check the paperwork status of everyone in
MAINTAINERS w.r.t. documentation, and ask each of the no-documentation
pre-2002 people if they wish to sign a new documenation assignment.  
For those who don't, they're marked as 'no-documentation' in MAINTAINERS
and notified. :-/  For those who do, their documentation changes can't be
committed until their paperwork is complete.

For the *past*, however, there's a serious problem; people may have 
checked in documentation changes under the assumption that they were 
paperwork-complete, and those people may no longer be maintainers, may 
not want to sign new paperwork, or whatever.  But their changes may not 
be trivial, or indeed practically removable at all (if other people 
have built on them).  If we are not to install their changes (which are 
already in CVS) what are we supposed to do?

--Nathanael

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread
* Manual contributions and copyright assignments
@ 2003-05-21 12:02 Gerald Pfeifer
  2003-05-22 11:44 ` Richard Stallman
  0 siblings, 1 reply; 4+ messages in thread
From: Gerald Pfeifer @ 2003-05-21 12:02 UTC (permalink / raw)
  To: gcc; +Cc: Richard Stallman

RMS asked us to implement the following policy:

  [P]lease don't install changes in the manual on the strength
  of copyright assignments signed before Jan 2002.  If a person signed
  before that, assign@gnu.org can look at the papers and tell you if
  they explicitly cover documentation.  If not, we should get new papers
  from that contributor.

As far as I understand, obvious fixes and minor changes (where we didn't
need a copyright assignment before) are not affected.


RMS, how do you suggest to proceed practically?  This seems to affect more
than 100 developers with CVS write access, any of which can commit patches
of her/his own or others, and about 700 contributors overall (according to
/gd/gnuorg/copyright.list).

Gerald
-- 
Gerald "Jerry"   pfeifer@dbai.tuwien.ac.at   http://www.pfeifer.com/gerald/

^ permalink raw reply	[flat|nested] 4+ messages in thread

end of thread, other threads:[~2003-05-23 18:17 UTC | newest]

Thread overview: 4+ messages (download: mbox.gz / follow: Atom feed)
-- links below jump to the message on this page --
2003-05-23 18:22 Manual contributions and copyright assignments Nathanael Nerode
  -- strict thread matches above, loose matches on Subject: below --
2003-05-21 12:02 Gerald Pfeifer
2003-05-22 11:44 ` Richard Stallman
2003-05-23 17:42   ` Joe Buck

This is a public inbox, see mirroring instructions
for how to clone and mirror all data and code used for this inbox;
as well as URLs for read-only IMAP folder(s) and NNTP newsgroup(s).