Some tests are "Artistic only" [rt.cpan.org #125815]

[atoomic]

Migrated from rt.cpan.org#125815 (status was 'open')

Requestors:

• ppisar@redhat.com

From ppisar@redhat.com on 2018-07-11 13:36:36:

t/dclone.t, t/tied.pl, and t/dump.pl files in Clone-0.39 distribution have this license declaration:

#  You may redistribute only under the terms of the Artistic License,
#  as specified in the README file that comes with the distribution.

README mentions only "the same terms as Perl itself" so I believe you refer to this Artistic License <https://dev.perl.org/licenses/artistic.html>.

My issue is that some distributor do not consider this Artistic license free enough, e.g. Fedora, and cannot distribute these files. Would it be possible for you to change the license for the three files to be the same as the other files as it reads in the README:

This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

I.e. GPL or Artistic?

From garu@cpan.org on 2018-10-23 23:15:23:

Hi there! Thank you for submitting this issue and for your patience. While I am the current maintainer of Clone, I was not the author of those files. I'm going to try and contact him to see if we can make a new release with the revised test files. Otherwise, I'm not sure how to proceed (do feel free to advise if you have knowledge on possible legal implications). Finally, as a suggestion, what if the current Fedora package maintainer removes those files from the Fedora Clone package? They are not required for the installation nor the use of Clone.

Thank you!

garu

On Wed Jul 11 09:36:36 2018, ppisar wrote:
> t/dclone.t, t/tied.pl, and t/dump.pl files in Clone-0.39 distribution
> have this license declaration:
> 
> #  You may redistribute only under the terms of the Artistic License,
> #  as specified in the README file that comes with the distribution.
> 
> README mentions only "the same terms as Perl itself" so I believe you
> refer to this Artistic License
> <https://dev.perl.org/licenses/artistic.html>.
> 
> My issue is that some distributor do not consider this Artistic
> license free enough, e.g. Fedora, and cannot distribute these files.
> Would it be possible for you to change the license for the three files
> to be the same as the other files as it reads in the README:
> 
> This module is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
> modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.
> 
> I.e. GPL or Artistic?

[ppisar]

While I am the current maintainer of Clone, I was not the author of those files. I'm going to try and contact him to see if we can make a new release with the revised test files.

Great to hear it. That's the best option.

Otherwise, I'm not sure how to proceed (do feel free to advise if you have knowledge on possible legal implications).

I think a mere statement by the author that he grants a permission to use the files under the new conditions would be enough. Without making a new release. It's also quite possible that the current license declaration wording was just a mistake and he actually thought the GPL or Artistic combination from the very beginning.

Finally, as a suggestion, what if the current Fedora package maintainer removes those files from the Fedora Clone package? They are not required for the installation nor the use of Clone.

Fedora already does that. But that has the disadvantage that it also does not execute the tests.

[finchr]

Hi, I am the original author of Clone. Unfortunately I am not the original author of the three files in question as I borrowed them from Storable.

[garu]

I talked to Raphael Manfredi and he has graciously granted us permission to redistribute these files under the same terms as Perl, and to alter the text inside the files to reflect this new policy.

So I did :)

Clone v0.42 contains the new wording and was just pushed to CPAN.

Thank you all for the help and the patience while we pursued the case.

Cheers!