[Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Richard W.M. Jones]

Hi, this bug was filed:

  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1530647

I notice that Florian is correct and copies of the reference manual do
indeed have a non-free license (specifically restrictions on making
derivative works).

Is this intended?  If so we'll have to drop this documentation from
Fedora which would be a shame.  If not, could the work be relicensed
under a suitable free license?

Rich.

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Boutillier, Pierre]

Hi Richard, Hi list,

I am not an authoritative voice, I only share what I'm aware in order to save time.

Don't hold your breath expecting a relicensing.

As you've already notice by yourself debian also ships the documentation as non-free package and everybody is already aware[1] of the drawback a non-free license has on integration in free distributions... (Coq has the exact same problem for example)

The rationale is the following:
Because scientifically research is evaluating through (and therefore sadly driven by) citation metrics, things built in academic settings have to be citable. The only way to cite a software (found up to now) is to cite its reference manual. The only way a reference manual can be admissible as a (citable) publication is if, once released, it is not editable.

But, indeed, if it is not editable, it is not free anymore... Here is where we are stuck and have been for a long time with no escape (so far).

I am (and I know I'm not the only one) sorry about that.

Pierre B.

[1] I didn't manage to dig out links to former discussion on the subject in the time frame I allocated to this reply but they are some and maybe someone can find them easier than I do.

> Le 3 janv. 2018 à 16:08, Richard W.M. Jones <rich@annexia.org> a écrit :
> 
> Hi, this bug was filed:
> 
>  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1530647
> 
> I notice that Florian is correct and copies of the reference manual do
> indeed have a non-free license (specifically restrictions on making
> derivative works).
> 
> Is this intended?  If so we'll have to drop this documentation from
> Fedora which would be a shame.  If not, could the work be relicensed
> under a suitable free license?
> 
> Rich.
> 
> -- 
> Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
> https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Allan Wegan]

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> The only way a reference manual can be admissible as a (citable)
> publication is if, once released, it is not editable.
> But, indeed, if it is not editable, it is not free anymore... Here is
> where we are stuck and have been for a long time with no escape (so
> far).

Not working in science myself - but is it forbidden to cite a specific
version of a manual as published by one specific source?

Just mentioning the repository where one got the manual from and the
commit ID or version ID given by the author should provide enough data
for everyone to be able to verify the cited source.



-- 
Allan Wegan
<http://www.allanwegan.de/>
Jabber: allanwegan@ffnord.net
 OTR-Fingerprint: E4DCAA40 4859428E B3912896 F2498604 8CAA126F
Jabber: allanwegan@jabber.ccc.de
 OTR-Fingerprint: A1AAA1B9 C067F988 4A424D33 98343469 29164587


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Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Hendrik Boom]

On Wed, Jan 03, 2018 at 07:13:14PM +0100, Allan Wegan wrote:
> > The only way a reference manual can be admissible as a (citable)
> > publication is if, once released, it is not editable.
> > But, indeed, if it is not editable, it is not free anymore... Here is
> > where we are stuck and have been for a long time with no escape (so
> > far).
> 
> Not working in science myself - but is it forbidden to cite a specific
> version of a manual as published by one specific source?
> 
> Just mentioning the repository where one got the manual from and the
> commit ID or version ID given by the author should provide enough data
> for everyone to be able to verify the cited source.

Have a look at how the Wikipedia says to cite their pages.  Then go do 
something similar. 

If you want, you can make available an official version (updated rarely, 
and possibly made avaailable in print form for those that want it so)
and a development version, which changes continuously.  Now and then 
produce a new edition, so that a citation can refer to page 75-79, 
second edition.

-- hendrik

> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Allan Wegan
> <http://www.allanwegan.de/>
> Jabber: allanwegan@ffnord.net
>  OTR-Fingerprint: E4DCAA40 4859428E B3912896 F2498604 8CAA126F
> Jabber: allanwegan@jabber.ccc.de
>  OTR-Fingerprint: A1AAA1B9 C067F988 4A424D33 98343469 29164587
> 

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Ashish Agarwal]

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> The only way a reference manual can be admissible as a (citable)
publication is if, once released, it is not editable.

I don't think so. A good citation is one that is accessible in the exact
form that the published work is based on. For work products that can
evolve, one should thus provide a version. In the case of the OCaml manual,
this is easy enough since it is maintained in git. Additionally, there is
no "requirement" that a citation follow this criteria.

On Wed, Jan 3, 2018 at 11:52 AM, Boutillier, Pierre <
Pierre_Boutillier@hms.harvard.edu> wrote:

> Hi Richard, Hi list,
>
> I am not an authoritative voice, I only share what I'm aware in order to
> save time.
>
> Don't hold your breath expecting a relicensing.
>
> As you've already notice by yourself debian also ships the documentation
> as non-free package and everybody is already aware[1] of the drawback a
> non-free license has on integration in free distributions... (Coq has the
> exact same problem for example)
>
> The rationale is the following:
> Because scientifically research is evaluating through (and therefore sadly
> driven by) citation metrics, things built in academic settings have to be
> citable. The only way to cite a software (found up to now) is to cite its
> reference manual. The only way a reference manual can be admissible as a
> (citable) publication is if, once released, it is not editable.
>
> But, indeed, if it is not editable, it is not free anymore... Here is
> where we are stuck and have been for a long time with no escape (so far).
>
> I am (and I know I'm not the only one) sorry about that.
>
> Pierre B.
>
> [1] I didn't manage to dig out links to former discussion on the subject
> in the time frame I allocated to this reply but they are some and maybe
> someone can find them easier than I do.
>
> > Le 3 janv. 2018 à 16:08, Richard W.M. Jones <rich@annexia.org> a écrit :
> >
> > Hi, this bug was filed:
> >
> >  https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1530647
> >
> > I notice that Florian is correct and copies of the reference manual do
> > indeed have a non-free license (specifically restrictions on making
> > derivative works).
> >
> > Is this intended?  If so we'll have to drop this documentation from
> > Fedora which would be a shame.  If not, could the work be relicensed
> > under a suitable free license?
> >
> > Rich.
> >
> > --
> > Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
> > https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
> > Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
> > Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs
>
>
> --
> Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
> https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs
>

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Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Xavier Leroy]

On 03/01/2018 16:08, Richard W.M. Jones wrote:
> I notice that Florian is correct and copies of the reference manual do
> indeed have a non-free license (specifically restrictions on making
> derivative works).
> Is this intended?

The restriction on derivative works is very much intended.

The license predates Creative Commons, but in CC terms it would be CC-BY-ND.

The reason is pretty much what Pierre Boutillier wrote.  We view this
manual as a scientific publication.  In those  publications, authors
take full responsibility for the contents of the text.  It's not like
a software license that starts by disclaiming all warranties and
liabilities.  So, if I have my name on it as one of the authors and if
I'm responsible for the contents, of course I won't let anyone modify
the contents without my approval.

>  If so we'll have to drop this documentation from Fedora which would
> be a shame.  If not, could the work be relicensed under a suitable
> free license?

Debian is happy with putting OCaml's manual in the non-free section.  

https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:Main lists CC-BY-ND as a good
license for contents, but doesn't list it (neither good nor bad) for
documentation.  Care to explain the difference between documentation
and contents?

- Xavier Leroy

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Marek Kubica]

On Thu, 4 Jan 2018 14:44:05 +0100
Xavier Leroy <xavier.leroy@inria.fr> wrote:

> The restriction on derivative works is very much intended.
> 
> The license predates Creative Commons, but in CC terms it would be
> CC-BY-ND.

Non-derivative licenses like the custom one on the OCaml manual and
also CC-BY-ND create annoying edge cases. We've seen the case of
Debian and Fedora already. But reading the license:

> - Any translation or derivative work of the OCaml documentation and
>  user's manual must be approved by the authors in writing before
>  distribution.

It also creates issues for people wanting to contribute to the OCaml
manual on e.g. GitHub. It is not possible to create a pull request with
a change to the manual on any public platform because that would be
publishing without approval.

Kind regards,
Marek

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Gabriel Scherer]

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> It also creates issues for people wanting to contribute to the OCaml
> manual on e.g. GitHub. It is not possible to create a pull request with
> a change to the manual on any public platform because that would be
> publishing without approval.


I think this view is exaggerated, as I don't think that the people who
wrote this clause would consider hosting (modified) .etex files on a Github
clone of the manual's repository as "distribution". To "distribute" the
documentation or manual, I would at least expect a rendered (compiled)
version of it. It is not necessary to distribute a rendered copy of the
manual to contribute to it.

I'm not particularly fond of custom licenses either, but I don't think that
they should be interpreted as making open-source contributions impossible.


On Fri, Jan 5, 2018 at 9:55 PM, Marek Kubica <marek@xivilization.net> wrote:

> On Thu, 4 Jan 2018 14:44:05 +0100
> Xavier Leroy <xavier.leroy@inria.fr> wrote:
>
> > The restriction on derivative works is very much intended.
> >
> > The license predates Creative Commons, but in CC terms it would be
> > CC-BY-ND.
>
> Non-derivative licenses like the custom one on the OCaml manual and
> also CC-BY-ND create annoying edge cases. We've seen the case of
> Debian and Fedora already. But reading the license:
>
> > - Any translation or derivative work of the OCaml documentation and
> >  user's manual must be approved by the authors in writing before
> >  distribution.
>
> It also creates issues for people wanting to contribute to the OCaml
> manual on e.g. GitHub. It is not possible to create a pull request with
> a change to the manual on any public platform because that would be
> publishing without approval.
>
> Kind regards,
> Marek
>
> --
> Caml-list mailing list.  Subscription management and archives:
> https://sympa.inria.fr/sympa/arc/caml-list
> Beginner's list: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ocaml_beginners
> Bug reports: http://caml.inria.fr/bin/caml-bugs
>

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Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Oliver Bandel]

Zitat von Marek Kubica <marek@xivilization.net> (Fri, 5 Jan 2018  
21:55:04 +0100)

> On Thu, 4 Jan 2018 14:44:05 +0100
> Xavier Leroy <xavier.leroy@inria.fr> wrote:
>
[...]
>
>> - Any translation or derivative work of the OCaml documentation and
>>  user's manual must be approved by the authors in writing before
>>  distribution.
>
> It also creates issues for people wanting to contribute to the OCaml
> manual on e.g. GitHub. It is not possible to create a pull request with
> a change to the manual on any public platform because that would be
> publishing without approval.
[...]

As I understand it: The official, approved version is, what INRIA provides via
*.tar.gz as ocaml release.
Anything before is unapproved stuff, staged to become approved.

Then providing pull-requests is no problem.
And, btw. creating a pull-request does not mean that they are accepted,
which is another step that seperates approved and non-approved.

Regarding the quotation-problem, the official version might come with
hashes and cryptographic igning of a document.
But it seems, such thing is missing in science in general.
For example measurement data can be found on many servers that provide  
data openly
(which is good), but so far no hashsums or signing of the data is done.
So, data corruption might occur, and the validity of data is gone.

This is not only a problem of computer science / OCaml docs.

Ciao,
   Oliver

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Richard W.M. Jones]

On Thu, Jan 04, 2018 at 02:44:05PM +0100, Xavier Leroy wrote:
> On 03/01/2018 16:08, Richard W.M. Jones wrote:
> >  If so we'll have to drop this documentation from Fedora which would
> > be a shame.  If not, could the work be relicensed under a suitable
> > free license?
> 
> Debian is happy with putting OCaml's manual in the non-free section.  
> 
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Licensing:Main lists CC-BY-ND as a good
> license for contents, but doesn't list it (neither good nor bad) for
> documentation.  Care to explain the difference between documentation
> and contents?

Thanks Xavier.  Fedora doesn't have a non-free section, although
people use other repositories such as RPMFusion which ship packages
that are legally difficult to ship for all sorts of reasons.

"Content" is stuff like clip art, fonts and things and apparently it's
not suitable for documentation.

We'll drop the documentation for now.

Rich.

-- 
Richard Jones

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Maxime Dénès]

Hi,

On 01/03/2018 05:52 PM, Boutillier, Pierre wrote:
> As you've already notice by yourself debian also ships the
documentation as non-free package and everybody is already aware[1] of
the drawback a non-free license has on integration in free
distributions... (Coq has the exact same problem for example)

Just to clarify, Coq does not use the same license for its reference
manual as OCaml. It uses OPL (with no options elected), which is
considered free by the FSF but not by Debian (because of a few technical
restrictions on derivative works, but nothing like having to ask
permission to the original authors before distribution).

AFAIK it never prevented it to be accepted as a citation, so I believe
the argument is incorrect. Xavier is talking about authorship
responsibility, which is different indeed.

On 01/04/2018 02:44 PM, Xavier Leroy wrote:
> So, if I have my name on it as one of the authors and if
> I'm responsible for the contents, of course I won't let anyone modify
> the contents without my approval.
> 
I probably don't understand the license text correctly, since I have
little knowledge on this topic. But just to clarify: if I want to push a
documentation patch to my public github fork of OCaml, do I need to
first get a written approval from  Xavier, Damien, Alain, Jacques,
Didier and Jérôme? If not, what exempts me from it (despite the third
item in the license)?

Maxime.

Re: [Caml-list] OCaml reference manual non-free license

[Maxime Dénès]

On 03/11/2018 12:20 PM, Maxime Dénès wrote:
> I probably don't understand the license text correctly, since I have
> little knowledge on this topic. But just to clarify: if I want to push a
> documentation patch to my public github fork of OCaml, do I need to
> first get a written approval from  Xavier, Damien, Alain, Jacques,
> Didier and Jérôme? If not, what exempts me from it (despite the third
> item in the license)?

Forget about this part, I had missed a message from Gabriel that already
answers it. So, no problem there, it seems.

Maxime.