COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Petr Stodulka]

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Hi,

I found that license file COPYING is different as compared with http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt
If I pass over with Linus's preamble, change is only about whitespaces - tabs vs. space.
Probably it's minor non-essential change, but some projects do this change, so rather I ask about that.



Regards,
Petr


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Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Junio C Hamano]

Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:

> I found that license file COPYING is different as compared with
> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt If I pass over with
> Linus's preamble, change is only about whitespaces - tabs
> vs. space.  Probably it's minor non-essential change, but some
> projects do this change, so rather I ask about that.

Interesting.  I cannot quite connect "some projects do this change"
and "so rather I ask".  Are you asking why this project changed it?

After running "diff" between the two, I think the changes are only
on the indented section title lines, and "git blame" tells us that
the section title lines in the copy we have has always been that way
since Linus added to it at 075b845a (Add a COPYING notice, making it
explicit that the license is GPLv2., 2005-04-11).

So, perhaps the copy Linus got originally had leading runs of spaces
that are multiples-of-8-long unexpanded to leading tabs back then,
or perhaps he did that unexpanding himself.

Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Petr Stodulka]

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On 4.2.2016 20:15, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:
> 
>> I found that license file COPYING is different as compared with
>> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt If I pass over with
>> Linus's preamble, change is only about whitespaces - tabs
>> vs. space.  Probably it's minor non-essential change, but some
>> projects do this change, so rather I ask about that.
> 
> Interesting.  I cannot quite connect "some projects do this change"
> and "so rather I ask".  Are you asking why this project changed it?

Nope. I apologize for my czenglish. It means: From my colleagues I hear,
that some projects had same differences (tabs vs. spaces) in their copy
of the license file and they make it later equivalent with the one in
gnu.org. So I ask rather here / point out this difference, if you know
about that or you want to have same one.

Yes, I know, it's just about whitespaces.

Petr.

> 
> After running "diff" between the two, I think the changes are only
> on the indented section title lines, and "git blame" tells us that
> the section title lines in the copy we have has always been that way
> since Linus added to it at 075b845a (Add a COPYING notice, making it
> explicit that the license is GPLv2., 2005-04-11).
> 
> So, perhaps the copy Linus got originally had leading runs of spaces
> that are multiples-of-8-long unexpanded to leading tabs back then,
> or perhaps he did that unexpanding himself.
> 
> 


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Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Junio C Hamano]

Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:

> On 4.2.2016 20:15, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>> Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:
>> 
>>> I found that license file COPYING is different as compared with
>>> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt If I pass over with
>>> Linus's preamble, change is only about whitespaces - tabs
>>> vs. space.  Probably it's minor non-essential change, but some
>>> projects do this change, so rather I ask about that.
>> 
>> Interesting.  I cannot quite connect "some projects do this change"
>> and "so rather I ask".  Are you asking why this project changed it?
>
> Nope. I apologize for my czenglish. It means: From my colleagues I hear,
> that some projects had same differences (tabs vs. spaces) in their copy
> of the license file and they make it later equivalent with the one in
> gnu.org.

I'd guess that these projects (among which Linux kernel still has
these indentation the same as the copy we have) and we independently
obtained the COPYING file from GNU in some past, and back then the
copy at GNU was indented that way--which later was changed.

The Wayback Machine supports this theory.

https://web.archive.org/web/20070713225446/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt

i.e. the FSF copy back in 2007-07 indented these section headers
with tabs, so those projects that obtained this copy would have
their sections indented with tabs.

At 703601d6 (Update COPYING with GPLv2 with new FSF address,
2010-01-15), we did a fresh update directly from the URL you cited
above to primarily replace the addresses of the FSF office.

https://web.archive.org/web/20100105100239/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt

matches what we use (minus Linus's preamble, of course).

The file before that change was what Linus copied from Linux kernel
project.  The kernel project did their equivalent change at their
b3358a11 ([PATCH] update FSF address in COPYING, 2005-09-10), and
the log message says http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.txt was used.

The Wayback Machine agrees.

https://web.archive.org/web/20050901115237/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.txt

i.e. the FSF copy back in 2005-09 matches what the kernel uses
(again, minus Linus's preamble).

> So I ask rather here / point out this difference, if you know
> about that or you want to have same one.

So the answers are:

 - No, I didn't personally know about the differences, and I suspect
   nobody particularly cared.

 - Not really, unless the difference has more substance.  For an
   example of an update with substance, the update we did in 2010
   had not just the FSF address change but also updated the fully
   spelled name of LGPL from Library to Lesser.

You may want to bug the kernel folks to update their copy; they
still spell it as Library General Public License.

Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Petr Stodulka]

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On 8.2.2016 18:28, Junio C Hamano wrote:
> Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:
> 
>> On 4.2.2016 20:15, Junio C Hamano wrote:
>>> Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com> writes:
>>>
>>>> I found that license file COPYING is different as compared with
>>>> http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt If I pass over with
>>>> Linus's preamble, change is only about whitespaces - tabs
>>>> vs. space.  Probably it's minor non-essential change, but some
>>>> projects do this change, so rather I ask about that.
>>>
>>> Interesting.  I cannot quite connect "some projects do this change"
>>> and "so rather I ask".  Are you asking why this project changed it?
>>
>> Nope. I apologize for my czenglish. It means: From my colleagues I hear,
>> that some projects had same differences (tabs vs. spaces) in their copy
>> of the license file and they make it later equivalent with the one in
>> gnu.org.
> 
> I'd guess that these projects (among which Linux kernel still has
> these indentation the same as the copy we have) and we independently
> obtained the COPYING file from GNU in some past, and back then the
> copy at GNU was indented that way--which later was changed.
> 
> The Wayback Machine supports this theory.
> 
> https://web.archive.org/web/20070713225446/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt
> 
> i.e. the FSF copy back in 2007-07 indented these section headers
> with tabs, so those projects that obtained this copy would have
> their sections indented with tabs.
> 
> At 703601d6 (Update COPYING with GPLv2 with new FSF address,
> 2010-01-15), we did a fresh update directly from the URL you cited
> above to primarily replace the addresses of the FSF office.
> 
> https://web.archive.org/web/20100105100239/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.txt
> 
> matches what we use (minus Linus's preamble, of course).
> 
> The file before that change was what Linus copied from Linux kernel
> project.  The kernel project did their equivalent change at their
> b3358a11 ([PATCH] update FSF address in COPYING, 2005-09-10), and
> the log message says http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.txt was used.
> 
> The Wayback Machine agrees.
> 
> https://web.archive.org/web/20050901115237/http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.txt
> 
> i.e. the FSF copy back in 2005-09 matches what the kernel uses
> (again, minus Linus's preamble).

I have expected that license was copied correctly in the past from gnu.org,
when same differences are in various projects. I just point out on another change.

Thank You for tip about web.archive.org - I really don't know about that web
and it can be useful.

> 
>> So I ask rather here / point out this difference, if you know
>> about that or you want to have same one.
> 
> So the answers are:
> 
>  - No, I didn't personally know about the differences, and I suspect
>    nobody particularly cared.
> 
>  - Not really, unless the difference has more substance.  For an
>    example of an update with substance, the update we did in 2010
>    had not just the FSF address change but also updated the fully
>    spelled name of LGPL from Library to Lesser.

Thank You for reponse.

> 
> You may want to bug the kernel folks to update their copy; they
> still spell it as Library General Public License.
> 

Everyone can do that. I believe that someone report it already or at least
constult it. I write about this here because I should do that. When You
know about this difference in license in kernel, I believe that they know
it too and they decide it is ok.

Regards,
Petr


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Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Stefan Beller]

As a reference for this discussion,
see c376d96 in git.git or e00bfcbf04 in linux.git
which deals with whitespaces in the developers certificate of origin.

Just send a patch, I'd say.

Thanks,
Stefan

Re: COPYING tabs vs whitespaces

[Petr Stodulka]

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On 9.2.2016 19:40, Stefan Beller wrote:
> As a reference for this discussion,
> see c376d96 in git.git or e00bfcbf04 in linux.git
> which deals with whitespaces in the developers certificate of origin.
> 
> Just send a patch, I'd say.
> 
> Thanks,
> Stefan
> --
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe git" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
> 

Just patch makes from whole thread more and more absurd discussion, no offense.
Don't matter if it is used or not. For me it's significant previous response from Junio.

I am not familiar with git send-email, so:
=======================[PATCH 1/2]====================================
From b2509773edf7e886513f450cb8e215a87278cdfc Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com>
Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 19:52:28 +0100
Subject: [PATCH 1/2] COPYING: replace tabs by spaces in license file

GPLv2 license file presented in gnu.org has replaced all tabs by spaces.
Unify whitespaces to make equivalent files (except preamble).
---
 COPYING | 15 ++++++++-------
 1 file changed, 8 insertions(+), 7 deletions(-)

diff --git a/COPYING b/COPYING
index 536e555..158a9b1 100644
--- a/COPYING
+++ b/COPYING
@@ -19,15 +19,16 @@
 
 ----------------------------------------
 
-		    GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
-		       Version 2, June 1991
+
+                    GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
+                       Version 2, June 1991
 
  Copyright (C) 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc.,
  51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA
  Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies
  of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.
 
-			    Preamble
+                            Preamble
 
   The licenses for most software are designed to take away your
 freedom to share and change it.  By contrast, the GNU General Public
@@ -77,7 +78,7 @@ patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all.
   The precise terms and conditions for copying, distribution and
 modification follow.
 
-		    GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
+                    GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
    TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
 
   0. This License applies to any program or other work which contains
@@ -276,7 +277,7 @@ make exceptions for this.  Our decision will be guided by the two goals
 of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and
 of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally.
 
-			    NO WARRANTY
+                            NO WARRANTY
 
   11. BECAUSE THE PROGRAM IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY
 FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW.  EXCEPT WHEN
@@ -298,9 +299,9 @@ YOU OR THIRD PARTIES OR A FAILURE OF THE PROGRAM TO OPERATE WITH ANY OTHER
 PROGRAMS), EVEN IF SUCH HOLDER OR OTHER PARTY HAS BEEN ADVISED OF THE
 POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
 
-		     END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
+                     END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
 
-	    How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
+            How to Apply These Terms to Your New Programs
 
   If you develop a new program, and you want it to be of the greatest
 possible use to the public, the best way to achieve this is to make it
-- 
2.4.3


=======================[PATCH 2/2]====================================
From 5a7bfe0b05f35238c7bc8d2680b168ef729d0e91 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Petr Stodulka <pstodulk@redhat.com>
Date: Tue, 9 Feb 2016 20:08:44 +0100
Subject: [PATCH 2/2] Unify tabs and spaces in preamble of COPYING file

---
 COPYING | 6 +++---
 1 file changed, 3 insertions(+), 3 deletions(-)

diff --git a/COPYING b/COPYING
index 158a9b1..bc404d9 100644
--- a/COPYING
+++ b/COPYING
@@ -9,13 +9,13 @@
  decision, you might note so in your copyright message, ie something
  like
 
-	This file is licensed under the GPL v2, or a later version
-	at the discretion of Linus.
+    This file is licensed under the GPL v2, or a later version
+    at the discretion of Linus.
 
   might avoid issues. But we can also just decide to synchronize and
   contact all copyright holders on record if/when the occasion arises.
 
-			Linus Torvalds
+            Linus Torvalds
 
 ----------------------------------------
 
-- 
2.4.3



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