FileCopyrightText...

[Harald Sitter]

On Mon, Jan 29, 2024 at 10:49 AM Carl Schwan <carl at carlschwan.eu> wrote:
>
> On Monday, January 29, 2024 10:43:04 AM CET Harald Sitter wrote:
> > do we really need it?
> >
> > systemd for example only has a spdx license header, resulting in much
> > tidier file headers.
> >
> > I entirely fail to understand why we need to slap a FileCopyrightText
> > on files. The copyright surely applies whether or not I put the
> > FileCopyrightText there. The list is also just about always
> > incomplete, further calling its use into question. Not to mention that
> > it is annoying book keeping of information that is already available
> > in git.
> >
> > Can someone shed some light on this?
>
> The reuse FAQ has an entry about why only keeping the copyright information in
> git is a bad idea: https://reuse.software/faq/#vcs-copyright

Yes, that makes no sense to me. Whether I put my copyright stamp on a
file or not has no impact on whether I actually have copyright. That
is to say when someone doesn't add their stamp they would still be a
copyright holder. Which means that unless everyone who ever touched a
file puts their stamp on it, which is something we didn't and don't
enforce, the list is inherently incomplete and by extension useless
... So, authorship data is in fact more relevant here because you get
all would-be copyright holders, not just the ones that bothered to put
their stamp on the file. No? ... Obviously the authors list may still
be incomplete but I'm willing to put money on the fact that 9/10 it is
more complete than whatever the license headers proclaim to be the
case.

> Also when copying file between repo, the git history for that file is often
> lost.

That is a fair point.

TBH I am more arguing against our current policy of requiring this
field. If someone wants to put their stamp on a file I have no
interest in stopping them. But, I for one would be content with just
putting the license there, hence my ponderings.

HS