Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[David Woodhouse]

On Sat, 2005-05-21 at 17:08 -0700, Linux Kernel Mailing List wrote:
> author David Woodhouse <dwmw2@org.rmk.(none)> Sat, 21 May 2005 15:52:23 +0100
> committer Russell King <rmk+kernel@arm.linux.org.uk> Sat, 21 May 2005 15:52:23 +0100
> 
> When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip
> with high-speed mode enabled, we switch it to high-speed mode so that
> baud_base becomes 921600. However, we also need to multiply the baud
> divisor by 8 at the same time, in case it's already in use as a console.
> 
> Signed-off-by: David Woodhouse
> Acked-by: Tom Rini
> Signed-off-by: Russell King <rmk+kernel@arm.linux.org.uk>

Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
information mangled or removed. I object to having my contributions
anonymised in this way, just as I object to the contributions of others
being anonymised. This makes it harder to contact those responsible for
changes which are committed via Russell's trees, and makes a nonsense of
the practice of including Signed-off-by: lines from the contributor.

If Russell thinks that he's bound by the UK's Data Protection Act, then
he presumably thinks that he's also obliged to honour my demand that he
correct my personal information in his 'database'. His nonsensical
amateur interpretation of the law would put him in a Catch-22 situation.

-- 
dwmw2

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Russell King]

On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 12:57:13PM +0100, David Woodhouse wrote:
> Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> information mangled or removed. I object to having my contributions
> anonymised in this way, just as I object to the contributions of others
> being anonymised. This makes it harder to contact those responsible for
> changes which are committed via Russell's trees, and makes a nonsense of
> the practice of including Signed-off-by: lines from the contributor.
> 
> If Russell thinks that he's bound by the UK's Data Protection Act, then
> he presumably thinks that he's also obliged to honour my demand that he
> correct my personal information in his 'database'. His nonsensical
> amateur interpretation of the law would put him in a Catch-22 situation.

David,

I don't have time nor the inclination to deal with your petty single
mindedness thought games at the moment.

However, what I will say is that if you think you know better than
solicitors, why don't you become one.  At that point you can start
preaching about such things to others.  Until then, your opinions
are only opinions and I don't have to take any notice what so ever
of you.

Welcome to /dev/null - since I can't handle the stress you're causing
by this.  It's nice and large and will contain everything further you
have to say on the subject *until* OSDL have completed their own
investigation into this issue.

It's rather a shame that you can't be patient and work this out in
a civilised manner isn't it?

Thanks.

-- 
Russell King
 Linux kernel    2.6 ARM Linux   - http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/
 maintainer of:  2.6 Serial core

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[David Woodhouse]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 13:59 +0100, Russell King wrote:
> Until then, your opinions are only opinions and I don't have to take
> any notice what so ever of you.

You're right that my opinions are irrelevant. 

However, if you are right in thinking that you're affected by the DPA,
then my request as a 'data subject' that you correct your copy of my
personal information would be entirely relevant, and you would be
legally obliged to obey.

> It's rather a shame that you can't be patient and work this out in
> a civilised manner isn't it?

Russell, you took a patch which I had Cc'd to you merely as a courtesy,
mangled the attribution and passed it on, despite the fact that I had
previously asked you not to do so.

When I asked you again not to do that, you were abusive. I'm sorry if
you feel that asking Linus not to apply such things isn't civilised --
but I did ask you politely first, only to receive an abusive reply:

<dwmw2_gone> rmk: I know your policy and that's why I sent the patch to
    akpm instead of to you. I Cc'd you as a courtesy. Yet you still
    mangled the attribution and sent my patch on.
<dwmw2_gone> So... are you going to refrain from doing that in future,
    or am I going to stop Ccing you?
<rmk> dwmw2: oh fuck you, sorry.  I'm really not in the mood for your 
    bloody mindedness.

All you needed to say was "OK, then I won't apply your patches".

-- 
dwmw2

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Russell King]

On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 01:59:44PM +0100, Russell King wrote:
> On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 12:57:13PM +0100, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> > information mangled or removed. I object to having my contributions
> > anonymised in this way, just as I object to the contributions of others
> > being anonymised. This makes it harder to contact those responsible for
> > changes which are committed via Russell's trees, and makes a nonsense of
> > the practice of including Signed-off-by: lines from the contributor.
> > 
> > If Russell thinks that he's bound by the UK's Data Protection Act, then
> > he presumably thinks that he's also obliged to honour my demand that he
> > correct my personal information in his 'database'. His nonsensical
> > amateur interpretation of the law would put him in a Catch-22 situation.
> 
> David,
> 
> I don't have time nor the inclination to deal with your petty single
> mindedness thought games at the moment.
> 
> However, what I will say is that if you think you know better than
> solicitors, why don't you become one.  At that point you can start
> preaching about such things to others.  Until then, your opinions
> are only opinions and I don't have to take any notice what so ever
> of you.
> 
> Welcome to /dev/null - since I can't handle the stress you're causing
> by this.  It's nice and large and will contain everything further you
> have to say on the subject *until* OSDL have completed their own
> investigation into this issue.
> 
> It's rather a shame that you can't be patient and work this out in
> a civilised manner isn't it?

I would like to add some further context to why I've had to take the
regretable course of action I have.

Firstly, I admit to accidentally applying David's patch, which I'm sorry
for doing.  However, that can't be undone.

However, we have discussed the issue of the DPA by private email.  When
I didn't reply for a period of 1h15, he noticed me on IRC and started
hounding me for an answer to his mail.  When I declined to give an
answer until OSDL have completed their investigation, but this wasn't
satisfactory.  The hounding continued.  Not surprising one eventually
gets annoyed.

So, because David couldn't get the answer he wanted, he's decided to
make the whole thing public as in his first mail to this list.

I feel that this hardly the attitude of a mature individual wishing to
resolve a difference of opinion.  It merely serves to cause alienation
and confrontation.

So, regretfully, this leaves me with the only option but to ignore
David via all forms of communication until the reason for deference
is resolved - namely the completion of OSDLs investigation.

-- 
Russell King
 Linux kernel    2.6 ARM Linux   - http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/
 maintainer of:  2.6 Serial core

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[David Woodhouse]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 14:41 +0100, Russell King wrote:
> Firstly, I admit to accidentally applying David's patch, which I'm
> sorry for doing.  However, that can't be undone.

Your apology is accepted, but isn't what I was asking for -- and neither
was I asking that you undo it, which obviously isn't possible.

I just wanted to you confirm that you wouldn't do it again. Wasn't that
much clear from the conversation?

You pointed out that I have the right not to send you patches, and I
replied that I was already exercising that right, but I'd merely Cc'd
you on this particular patch as a courtesy. I said "I don't want to have
to stop Cc'ing you when I send patches which you might be interested in.
Please either commit my patches with correct attribution, or don't
commit them at all." 

Your reply didn't include a response to that specific request and seemed
to be disagreeing. So yes, I asked for clarification because I really
don't want to be in a position where I have to refuse to Cc you when
making changes I know you care about...

<dwmw2_gone> rmk: you didn't reply to my last mail. Do you want me to
    continue to Cc you on stuff I think you'll care about?
<rmk> dwmw2: because there's no point in responding any further.
<rmk> dwmw2: certainly not until OSDL provide the results of their
    investigation.
<dwmw2_gone> rmk: I asked a specific question. Are you going to continue
    to take patches on which you were Cc'd merely as a courtesy, mangle 
    the attribution, and send them on?
<dwmw2_gone> If so, I'll refrain from Ccing you in future
<dwmw2_gone> If you are going to either refrain from mangling the
    attribution, or refrain from sending them on in mangled form,
    then that's fine and I'll continue to Cc you. 
<rmk> dwmw2: you know my policy, and I don't see why I should 
    double-standard and open myself up to further flames just because
    your[sic] whinging and being your usual bloody minded self over this.
<dwmw2_gone> rmk: I know your policy and that's why I sent the patch 
    to akpm instead of to you. I Cc'd you as a courtesy. Yet you still 
    mangled the attribution and sent my patch on. 
<dwmw2_gone> So... are you going to refrain from doing that in future, 
    or am I going to stop Ccing you?
<rmk> dwmw2: oh fuck you, sorry.  I'm really not in the mood for your 
    bloody mindedness.
* rmk wanders off
<dwmw2_gone> fine. Then don't bitch in future if I change stuff without
    Ccing you

It wasn't an unreasonable request, Russell. I didn't ask you to abandon
your 'policy'; I just asked you not to apply my patches if you insist on
sticking to that policy unconditionally. Again, I'm sorry if you find
that request too onerous or unreasonable. I _could_ relieve you of that
task by just sending patches in without letting you see them -- but as I
said, I'd rather not.

But if I'm really being filed to /dev/null then the question is moot. I
shall simply not bother to Cc you in future when submitting patches I
think you'll care about. The question is therefore answered; thank you.

-- 
dwmw2

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Alan Cox]

> So, regretfully, this leaves me with the only option but to ignore
> David via all forms of communication until the reason for deference
> is resolved - namely the completion of OSDLs investigation.

Would a few people mind growing up ?

Let me make the obvious little point that nobody has it seems bothered
to notice. Dwmw2 asked you to not mangle his headers. Whatever the data
protection legislation covers is open to some debate but he has clearly
giving you permission to include them unmangled. End of debate both in
DP law and by estoppel.

There is also a really simple and trivial way to deal with data
protection questions in this case with complete clarity, without
tantrums and without an army of lawyers - that is to follow the whole
point and goal of such systems.

Take the existing OSDL statement which must be attached to all
submissions by reference or directly and update it to include

"A public record of contributions is kept which includes the name and
email address of each contributor. By contributing to the kernel project
I accept that my email address provided will be part of that public
record."

and the problem goes away. 

I think this change is worth making anyway, perceived privacy is an ever
growing issue of importance in our surveillance and database society
worldwide.

Alan

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, Alan Cox wrote:
> 
> Take the existing OSDL statement which must be attached to all
> submissions by reference or directly and update it to include

You mean DCO, not OSDL ("Developer's Certificate of Origin").

And yes, I'll update the SubmittingPatches to state explicitly that the 
sign-off is a public record.

> "A public record of contributions is kept which includes the name and
> email address of each contributor. By contributing to the kernel project
> I accept that my email address provided will be part of that public
> record."

Note that we've never _required_ that the sign-off has an email address 
per se. I much much prefer people to have them, because the sign-off lines 
really have been very useful when we've had issues with some patch 
(several times I've just been able to send a directed email to everybody 
involved), but I don't actually want this to be a requirement. After all, 
10 years goes by, and many people will end up having different email 
addresses anyway.

So I'll just update the documentation that explains the DCO to say 
something like this, and not make it part of the official DCO itself. 
After all, all we really want the sign-off to signify is that you've been 
involved and have the right to pass changes on - the fact that the end 
result is public is really a different issue.

So how about just something like the appended? Along with making a very 
public announcement on linux-kernel for the next kernel release (rather 
than this discussion that is taking place under a fairly obscure subject), 
that should make sure that people are aware of the fact that the thing 
isn't exactly private.

(I think everybody realized that anyway, since a private sign-off would be 
totally pointless, but hey, let's make things as explicit as possible).

		Linus

----
diff --git a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
--- a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
+++ b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
@@ -299,6 +299,16 @@ Some people also put extra tags at the e
 now, but you can do this to mark internal company procedures or just
 point out some special detail about the sign-off. 
 
+PRIVACY NOTE! This sign-off - with full name and preferably email
+address - is for obvious reasons going to be very publicly archived with
+the kernel, and as such we are _not_ going to keep these things private. 
+
+If you want to use a special email address for sign-off procedures for
+this reason, feel free to do that, but since the email address ends up
+being very useful if it turns out that the patch had a bug, we really do
+prefer an active and live email address.  We encourage people to use
+spamassassin etc tools to fight spam. 
+
 
 -----------------------------------
 SECTION 2 - HINTS, TIPS, AND TRICKS

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Alan Cox]

On Sul, 2005-05-22 at 22:50, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> You mean DCO, not OSDL ("Developer's Certificate of Origin").
> 
> And yes, I'll update the SubmittingPatches to state explicitly that the 
> sign-off is a public record.

The DCO yes.

> So how about just something like the appended? Along with making a very 
> public announcement on linux-kernel for the next kernel release (rather 
> than this discussion that is taking place under a fairly obscure subject), 
> that should make sure that people are aware of the fact that the thing 
> isn't exactly private.

It actually doesn't help. EU privacy law rather sensibly is "opt-in".
Putting the statement in the DCO, which is a document and submission
agreement works because you have to agree to it, putting it in a
document is probably not "opt-in".

You have to -actively- agree to the DCO to submit a change, and that is
what makes it work (whether you put something in submitting patches or
not that is more explanatory).

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, Alan Cox wrote:
> 
> You have to -actively- agree to the DCO to submit a change, and that is
> what makes it work (whether you put something in submitting patches or
> not that is more explanatory).

Ok, that would imply that we'll need to bump the version to 1.1 or
something. So how about something like this? I'll also run it past the
OSDL lawyer, and if others were to run it past their lawyers, that would
be good.

I can't imagine that this change really would upset anybody, but hey,
let's double- and triple-check before I commit something like this.. As
mentioned, I think everybody is _very_ aware that Linux is a public
project, and I can't imagine that there are kernel developers who haven't
seen the changelogs we keep, so this feels a bit unnecessary, but let's 
be careful..

		Linus

----
diff --git a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
--- a/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
+++ b/Documentation/SubmittingPatches
@@ -271,7 +271,7 @@ patch, which certifies that you wrote it
 pass it on as a open-source patch.  The rules are pretty simple: if you
 can certify the below:
 
-        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.0
+        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1
 
         By making a contribution to this project, I certify that:
 
@@ -291,6 +291,11 @@ can certify the below:
             person who certified (a), (b) or (c) and I have not modified
             it.
 
+	(d) I understand that the project is public, and that a record is
+	    kept of not just my submission but also of my sign-off,
+	    including whatever personal information (eg email address)
+	    that I include in the submission.
+
 then you just add a line saying
 
 	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Alan Cox]

On Sul, 2005-05-22 at 23:40, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> +	(d) I understand that the project is public, and that a record is

I'd s/a record/a public record/ in the interests of clarity, but see
what the lawyers say. Otherwise looks good.

Alan

"In my paradise the streets are paved with lawyers"
		Anon.

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Willy Tarreau]

Linus,

On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 03:40:24PM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
(...)
> -        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.0
> +        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1
(...)
>  then you just add a line saying
>  
>  	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>

Why not change this slightly to something like :

       DCO-1.1-Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>

which would imply that this person has read (and agreed with) version 1.1 ?

Willy

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Dmitry Torokhov]

On Sunday 22 May 2005 23:09, Willy Tarreau wrote:
> Linus,
> 
> On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 03:40:24PM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> (...)
> > -        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.0
> > +        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1
> (...)
> >  then you just add a line saying
> >  
> >  	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> 
> Why not change this slightly to something like :
> 
>        DCO-1.1-Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> 
> which would imply that this person has read (and agreed with) version 1.1 ?
>

Ugh, that's ugly, long and redundant. You could have:

      DCO-m.n: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>

but it still looks ugly.   

-- 
Dmitry

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Willy Tarreau]

On Mon, May 23, 2005 at 12:15:48AM -0500, Dmitry Torokhov wrote:
> On Sunday 22 May 2005 23:09, Willy Tarreau wrote:
> > Linus,
> > 
> > On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 03:40:24PM -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > (...)
> > > -        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.0
> > > +        Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1
> > (...)
> > >  then you just add a line saying
> > >  
> > >  	Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> > 
> > Why not change this slightly to something like :
> > 
> >        DCO-1.1-Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> > 
> > which would imply that this person has read (and agreed with) version 1.1 ?
> >
> 
> Ugh, that's ugly, long and redundant. You could have:
> 
>       DCO-m.n: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> 
> but it still looks ugly.   

Well, it could be anything ugly. The advantage of keeping the "Signed-off-by"
is that tools which already rely on this string will still find it.

Willy

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Mon, 23 May 2005, Willy Tarreau wrote:
> 
> Why not change this slightly to something like :
> 
>        DCO-1.1-Signed-off-by: Random J Developer <random@developer.org>
> 
> which would imply that this person has read (and agreed with) version 1.1 ?

This is one reason I wanted to avoid the 1.0->1.1 change.

I think that if somebody really cares about the version, the above is 
certainly acceptable.

In general, I'd personally not use it, and it seems pointless. If we make
some _real_ changes to the DCO that really matter rather than the 1.0->1.1
thing that I'd consider "obvious clarifications", we'll probably have to 
change the sign-off.

As it is, I think we should just make the change very public and let
people know about it, and go with it, because quite frankly, even if
somebody claims that they didn't know about the new version of the DCO,
he'd have to be crazy to claim that he didn't know Linux was public and 
that the resulting sign-off is public too, so I see it as a "comfort 
level" thing, not anything fundamental.

(And note that even the "comfort level" is not for the people doing the
sign-off, but for the person _receiving_ the sign-off).

		Linus

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
> 
> Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> information mangled or removed.

I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
yet.

So either rmk needs to stop worrying about UK legal issues (the law itself 
sounds fine, but the stupidity is in potential interpretations of it, and 
I'm hoping we can get a statement saying that such an interpretation is 
not actually valid), or rmk would need to special-case you and others that 
explicitly ask him not to mangle sign-offs.

Now, having myself aggressively automated a lot of what I do just to be 
able to keep up, I have to admit that I understand rmk's objections to 
special-casing certain email addresses very well. It tends to just not be 
worth the pain.

So for now, it looks like we either have to make sure that rmk is 
comfortable with not editing sign-off's (working on it, but I can't 
guarantee anything), or that you're ok with getting the email stripped, 
_or_ you will end up having to send patches directly to me rather than to 
rmk (and face the chaos and bumbling that is Linus).

		Linus

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[David Woodhouse]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> So for now, it looks like we either have to make sure that rmk is 
> comfortable with not editing sign-off's (working on it, but I can't 
> guarantee anything), or that you're ok with getting the email stripped, 
> _or_ you will end up having to send patches directly to me rather than to 
> rmk (and face the chaos and bumbling that is Linus).

I think I can handle the chaos and bumbling that is Linus. In fact I
sent this one to Andrew to give it a bit of exposure in the -mm tree
first, but since it's a serial patch I also copied it to Russell as a
courtesy. 

Russell has now said that he committed it by accident, and from that I
infer that he's not going to make a habit of it. So that ought to
suffice for now.

The government department responsible for administering the DPA has a
'Data Protection Help-Line' which I have asked to clarify the situation;
it shouldn't be necessary to pay lawyers to do it. But then again, I can
well imagine that they'll simply refer me to the Act itself rather than
giving a coherent answer, so maybe a paid opinion would be useful.

-- 
dwmw2

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> 
> On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > 
> > Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> > information mangled or removed.
> 
> I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
> issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
> lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
> yet.

there is a potential nasty interaction with the UK moral rights thing
where an author can demand that his authorship claim remains intact...
so if David objects to his authorship being mangled (and partially
removed) he may have a strong legal position to do so.

Arjan ... who is wondering if the UK DPA law is in conflict with UK
copyright law and is glad to not be in the UK anymore

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Russell King]

On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 08:14:06PM +0200, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > 
> > On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > > 
> > > Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> > > information mangled or removed.
> > 
> > I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
> > issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
> > lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
> > yet.
> 
> there is a potential nasty interaction with the UK moral rights thing
> where an author can demand that his authorship claim remains intact...
> so if David objects to his authorship being mangled (and partially
> removed) he may have a strong legal position to do so.

Actually, that only depends on whether you decide that Signed-off-by:
reflects authorship.  There's evidence to say that it may not:

1. There can be multiple Signed-off-by: lines in a patch - many of whom
   are not authors of the code.

2. The first Signed-off-by: line may not be the author of the code if
   the author has not added that himself.  It may be a subsystem
   maintainers.

If you don't believe either of those, I suggest you re-read the original
discussions about Signed-off-by: and refresh your memory that, in fact,
all Signed-off-by: is saying is that _someone_ accepts responsibility
for submitting the patch.

If you still don't accept that, here's the actual text in
SubmittingPatches - maybe it's wrong?

| The sign-off is a simple line at the end of the explanation for the
| patch, which certifies that you wrote it or otherwise have the right to
                                              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
| pass it on as a open-source patch.
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Let's look at it another way.  Signed-off-by: is a mark of attributation
and authorship.  If someone were to receive an un-signedoff patch but
had the right to pass it on as an open-source patch, according to your
position it would be wrong to add a "Signed-off-by:" line, because that's
like falsely claiming your the author of the code.  And what about all
the other Signed-off-by: lines which are subsequently added by Andrew
and Linus?  Aren't they falsely claiming authorship as well?

Therefore, claiming that Signed-off-by: is a mark of attributation
or authorship is obviously nonsense.

-- 
Russell King
 Linux kernel    2.6 ARM Linux   - http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/
 maintainer of:  2.6 Serial core

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Arjan van de Ven]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 19:44 +0100, Russell King wrote:
> On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 08:14:06PM +0200, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > > 
> > > On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> > > > information mangled or removed.
> > > 
> > > I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
> > > issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
> > > lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
> > > yet.
> > 
> > there is a potential nasty interaction with the UK moral rights thing
> > where an author can demand that his authorship claim remains intact...
> > so if David objects to his authorship being mangled (and partially
> > removed) he may have a strong legal position to do so.
> 
> Actually, that only depends on whether you decide that Signed-off-by:
> reflects authorship.


author David Woodhouse <dwmw2@org.rmk.(none)> Sat, 21 May 2005 15:52:23 +0100

that looks far more like an authorship statement and is also munged.

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Russell King]

On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 08:51:17PM +0200, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 19:44 +0100, Russell King wrote:
> > On Sun, May 22, 2005 at 08:14:06PM +0200, Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> > > On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
> > > > > 
> > > > > Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
> > > > > information mangled or removed.
> > > > 
> > > > I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
> > > > issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
> > > > lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
> > > > yet.
> > > 
> > > there is a potential nasty interaction with the UK moral rights thing
> > > where an author can demand that his authorship claim remains intact...
> > > so if David objects to his authorship being mangled (and partially
> > > removed) he may have a strong legal position to do so.
> > 
> > Actually, that only depends on whether you decide that Signed-off-by:
> > reflects authorship.
> 
> 
> author David Woodhouse <dwmw2@org.rmk.(none)> Sat, 21 May 2005 15:52:23 +0100
> 
> that looks far more like an authorship statement and is also munged.

In which case we have a problem:

http://www.kernel.org/git/gitweb.cgi?p=linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux-2.6.git;a=commit;h=12f49643bc44c428919b210148a930496827dd26

Therefore, I put forward that this thing which appears to be called
"author" does not reflect authorship, but who submitted it.

Alternatively, if you are right, we must not wrongfully claim people
"author" code in this way, and the above log entry needs fixing.
Since that's not possible, we must refuse patches from people who
aren't themselves the authors of the submitted code.  But how do we
positively know that in every case?

That's another very interesting problem you've just brought up with
public project systems.  And of course now that it's been identified
it needs addressing.  8(

-- 
Russell King
 Linux kernel    2.6 ARM Linux   - http://www.arm.linux.org.uk/
 maintainer of:  2.6 Serial core

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, Russell King wrote:
> 
> Therefore, I put forward that this thing which appears to be called
> "author" does not reflect authorship, but who submitted it.

It _is_ supposed to reflect authorship, but it does so within the context 
of the SCM, not in any other larger context. In git, "author:" is a fairly 
descriptive TAG, nothing more.

Don't get hung up about technicalities. If the field said

	frog: Arjan van de Ven <arjan@infradead.org>

that wouldn't mean that Arjan would have been magically transformed into a
frog in the real world sense, would it?

The fact that the field says "author:" does not mean that the person named
is necessarily the "author" in the _copyright_ sense, it only means that
he is the author in the limited sense that "git" gives it. And in the 
limited "git" sense, it's really an educated guess, aka "we're tryign to 
give credit where credit is due".

The fact is, trying to be technical about single words in human language
and thinking that that a meaning in one specific context carries over to
some other usage of a word in another context is simply not true. Not 
here, not _anywhere_. 

And btw, lawyers and judges aren't idiots either. They're human beings, 
and they can tell the difference between two contexts. Trying to argue 
some silly technicality with a judge is not likely to get you very far in 
general.

		Linus

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Brian O'Mahoney]

Please see below.

Linus Torvalds wrote:
> 
> On Sun, 22 May 2005, Russell King wrote:
> 
>>Therefore, I put forward that this thing which appears to be called
>>"author" does not reflect authorship, but who submitted it.
> 
> 
> It _is_ supposed to reflect authorship, but it does so within the context 
> of the SCM, not in any other larger context. In git, "author:" is a fairly 
> descriptive TAG, nothing more.
> 
> Don't get hung up about technicalities. If the field said
> 
> 	frog: Arjan van de Ven <arjan@infradead.org>
> 
> that wouldn't mean that Arjan would have been magically transformed into a
> frog in the real world sense, would it?
> 
> The fact that the field says "author:" does not mean that the person named
> is necessarily the "author" in the _copyright_ sense, it only means that
> he is the author in the limited sense that "git" gives it. And in the 
> limited "git" sense, it's really an educated guess, aka "we're tryign to 
> give credit where credit is due".

There is an argument, after SCO, for a

copyright: xxx

tag, and a clear public statement on the kernel.org home page about
assignment, the GPL and submission.

> 
> The fact is, trying to be technical about single words in human language
> and thinking that that a meaning in one specific context carries over to
> some other usage of a word in another context is simply not true. Not 
> here, not _anywhere_. 
> 
> And btw, lawyers and judges aren't idiots either. They're human beings, 
> and they can tell the difference between two contexts. Trying to argue 
> some silly technicality with a judge is not likely to get you very far in 
> general.

Absolutely right, and outside the US, the Costs in Cause, principle
means that any attempt at vexatious litigation is likely to prove an
expensive mistake.

-- 
mit freundlichen Grüßen, Brian.

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Brian O'Mahoney]

There is NO Question(TM), the DPA is about the privacy, appropriateness,
accuracy of private data and the way that data can be used by government
or industry, and I can see no reason why anyone should remove
'sign-offs' or other identification in the original e-mail which forms
part of the original communication, if legal advice was received to
the contrary it is _plain_wrong_; (for example we could not store e-mail
sent to us, which is often mandatory to the proper conduct of business).

Copyright law is complicated, since it differs in the UK, EU and non EU
contries, such as Switzerland; so in the UK copyright automatically
persists in anything I write, in the US it dosn't, BUT, if a Bern
Convention copyright notice is included, eg:

(c) 2005, Brian O'Mahoney, all rights reserved, this notice and any
'Signed-off-by:' notice included herein must remain unmodified.

then this is binding in all signatorey countries to the Bern Copyright
convention including the EC, UK and US, and courts including the
UK High Court, the European Court in Luxembourg and several US Federal
Circuits have upheld such terms and have issued injunctions and damages
for breach _and_ such notice would serve as a definitive defense to any
DPA complaint, from the DPA regulator (permission is given), or the
copyright holder (compromise).

So Copyright will always rule over DPA and violation of Copyright
======================================
is a tort.

Next the, so called 'Moral Right (droit morale)' in the UK is simply
the new European name for the automatic assumption of Copyright, and
is irrelevant, via a vis Economic Right, in the presence of an explicit
Bern Convention notice.

Finally a short note on the Bern and UCC conventions is set
out below:

The Universal Copyright Convention (UCC), which had as a main purpose
the inclusion of the United States in a general system of international
copyright, was signed at Geneva in 1952. It was accepted by the United
States in 1954 and came into effect the following year. The U.S.
copyright law was modified to conform to the convention, notably by
elimination of procedural steps for the establishment of U.S. copyright
in works published in other signatory countries and of the requirement
that works in the English language by foreign authors be manufactured in
the United States to obtain U.S. copyright protection. The United
Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
played a leading part in the negotiations for the UCC, which was revised
in 1971. In 1989 the United States became a member of the Berne
Convention, which was most recently revised in 1971.


Arjan van de Ven wrote:
> On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 09:59 -0700, Linus Torvalds wrote:
> 
>>On Sun, 22 May 2005, David Woodhouse wrote:
>>
>>>Linus, please do not apply patches from me which have my personal
>>>information mangled or removed.
>>
>>I've asked Russell not to do it, but the fact is, he's worried about legal 
>>issues, and while I've also tried to resolve those (by having the OSDL 
>>lawyer try to contact some lawyers in the UK), that hasn't been clarified 
>>yet.
> 
> 
> there is a potential nasty interaction with the UK moral rights thing
> where an author can demand that his authorship claim remains intact...
> so if David objects to his authorship being mangled (and partially
> removed) he may have a strong legal position to do so.
> 
> Arjan ... who is wondering if the UK DPA law is in conflict with UK
> copyright law and is glad to not be in the UK anymore
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -
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> 
> 

-- 
mit freundlichen Grüßen, Brian.

Brian

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Lee Revell]

On Sun, 2005-05-22 at 21:58 +0200, Brian O'Mahoney wrote:
> There is NO Question(TM), the DPA is about the privacy, appropriateness,
> accuracy of private data and the way that data can be used by government
> or industry, and I can see no reason why anyone should remove
> 'sign-offs' or other identification in the original e-mail which forms
> part of the original communication, if legal advice was received to
> the contrary it is _plain_wrong_; (for example we could not store e-mail
> sent to us, which is often mandatory to the proper conduct of business).
> 
> Copyright law is complicated, since it differs in the UK, EU and non EU
> contries, such as Switzerland; so in the UK copyright automatically
> persists in anything I write, in the US it dosn't, BUT, if a Bern
> Convention copyright notice is included, eg:
> 

Are you a lawyer?  I think "copyright automatically persists in anything
you write" in the US as well.

Lee

Re: When we detect that a 16550 was in fact part of a NatSemi SuperIO chip

[Linus Torvalds]

On Sun, 22 May 2005, Brian O'Mahoney wrote:
> 
> Copyright law is complicated, since it differs in the UK, EU and non EU
> contries, such as Switzerland; so in the UK copyright automatically
> persists in anything I write, in the US it dosn't

You don't need a copyright notice even in the US any more, afaik. The US 
signed the Berne convention late, but did sign it.

You own copyright on anything you write, as logn as it's copyrightable in 
the first place, of course. Not everything is.

[ Although if you're going to sue somebody for wilful infringement, I
  suspect that in practice you'd have better made your copyright known
  some way. ]

And no, I'm not a lawyer, and I don't play one on TV. And I don't see why 
people discuss technicalities.

		Linus