Natty: Where did my changelogs go?

[Cody A.W. Somerville]

On Fri, Nov 19, 2010 at 5:48 PM, Clint Byrum <clint at ubuntu.com> wrote:

> On Fri, 2010-11-19 at 21:45 +0100, Tollef Fog Heen wrote:
> > ]] Martin Pitt
> >
> > | Tollef Fog Heen [2010-11-14 22:20 +0100]:
> > | > ]] Martin Pitt
> > | > This looks like a violation of the GPL (v2 at least) 2a):
> > | >
> > | >     a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices
> > | >     stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
> > | >
> > | > Has anybody looked into that or given that any thought?
> > |
> > | Our legal department has checked GPL, MPL, Apache, Artistic, and a few
> > | other common licenses, and said that it was okay to ship binaries
> > | without changelogs (at all -- and now we at least ship the topmost
> > | bits of it).
> > |
> > | Above clause doesn't apply to binaries, but to the source code
> > | apparently.
> >
> > That still means any scripts or files where what's in the source is also
> > in the binary and where said script or file is changed requires the
> > changelogs to be present.  Are anybody making sure that's the case?
> >
>
> Good point. This should actually be pretty straight forward.
>
> In pkgbinarymangler, scan diffs (main diff.gz for debsrc 1.0, patches
> for 3.0 (quilt), other patches if found under debian) for changed files,
> and use rsync-like checks to ensure none of the changed files made it
> into any of the binary packages. (rsync like meaning, check size, then
> check crc32, then stronger hash..). If any changed files made it in,
> then keep the changelog.
>
> I think given Martin Pitt's comments about the legal review, this only
> applies to scripts and include headers. It wouldn't be necessary for
> binaries that include sections of changed text.
>

I don't understand how the inclusion of the chanelog has anything to do with
compliance of that section of the gpl for files other than the changelog its
self. That section is specifying that if you edit a file you must ensure you
include a notice in the file that you modified (not some other file) and
that the notice must include the date you made the change. I don't see any
provision in the gpl for those notices to be aggregated or expressed via a
changelog but I'm not a lawyer so maybe someone can enlighten me?

Cheers,

-- 
Cody A.W. Somerville
Release Engineer
Foundations Team
Custom Engineering Solutions Group
Canonical OEM Services
Phone: +1 781 850 2087
Cell: +1 613 401 5141
Fax: +1 613 687 7368
Email: cody.somerville at canonical.com
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