[GRASS5] Licensing problem

GRASS GRASS developer
1

Markus by accident found out that there is a potential
licensing problem left that we need to deal with.

It probably affects all versions of GRASS
and especially the upcoming 5.0.3.

We need to:

  a) replace ./src/include/color.h

  Method 1: Check if there once was a public domain version
  with this file and use that one.

  Method 2:
  The contents itself a simple.

  Glynn: Would it make sense to rewrite this and
  reshuffle the stuff with colors.h into one file anyway?
  If yes, would you be willing to do it?

  b)
  Temporarily remove r.agnps50 from GRASS and
  move it into non-free until we can resolve this issue.

  Step i): Remove it from the release branch.

  Step ii): Contact the AGNPS people for clarification
      of the copyright.
     http://www.sedlab.olemiss.edu/agnps.html

Can somebody help with "Method 1" and b i),
then I'm willing to do b ii).

More Details:

http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=208449
"Multiple copyright issues/GRASS"

Mentions to :
./src/include/color.h
./src/raster/r.agnps50/agview/find_old_map.c

2

Bernhard Reiter wrote:

Markus by accident found out that there is a potential
licensing problem left that we need to deal with.

It probably affects all versions of GRASS
and especially the upcoming 5.0.3.

We need to:

  a) replace ./src/include/color.h

  Method 1: Check if there once was a public domain version
  with this file and use that one.

  Method 2:
  The contents itself a simple.

  Glynn: Would it make sense to rewrite this and
  reshuffle the stuff with colors.h into one file anyway?
  If yes, would you be willing to do it?

Method 3:

Delete src/include/color.h and replace its sole use in
src/ps.map/ps.map/cmd/vector.h with a local definition for the only
portion which is actually used:

  typedef struct {
    unsigned short r, g, b;
  } RGB;

I'm fairly sure that the above struct definition doesn't qualify as an
"original work".

--
Glynn Clements <glynn.clements@virgin.net>

3

On Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 12:07:40AM +0100, Glynn Clements wrote:

Bernhard Reiter wrote:

> Markus by accident found out that there is a potential
> licensing problem left that we need to deal with.
>
> It probably affects all versions of GRASS
> and especially the upcoming 5.0.3.
>
>
> We need to:
>
> a) replace ./src/include/color.h
>
> Method 1: Check if there once was a public domain version
> with this file and use that one.
>
> Method 2:
> The contents itself a simple.
>
> Glynn: Would it make sense to rewrite this and
> reshuffle the stuff with colors.h into one file anyway?
> If yes, would you be willing to do it?

Method 3:

Delete src/include/color.h and replace its sole use in
src/ps.map/ps.map/cmd/vector.h with a local definition for the only
portion which is actually used:

  typedef struct {
    unsigned short r, g, b;
  } RGB;

Sound good to me if "color.h" is not included somewhere else.
Can you make the change Method 3 then?

I'm fairly sure that the above struct definition doesn't qualify as an
"original work".

I agree.

4

On Thu, Sep 25, 2003 at 05:45:31PM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:

On Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 12:07:40AM +0100, Glynn Clements wrote:
> Bernhard Reiter wrote:

> > We need to:
> >
> > a) replace ./src/include/color.h

> Method 3:
>
> Delete src/include/color.h and replace its sole use in
> src/ps.map/ps.map/cmd/vector.h with a local definition for the only
> portion which is actually used:
>
> typedef struct {
> unsigned short r, g, b;
> } RGB;

Sound good to me if "color.h" is not included somewhere else.
Can you make the change Method 3 then?

I've done the change for releasebranch_26_april_2002_5_0_0 now.

5

On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 12:57:39PM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:

We need to:

  b)
  Temporarily remove r.agnps50 from GRASS and
  move it into non-free until we can resolve this issue.

  Step i): Remove it from the release branch.

As both releasebranch_26_april_2002_5_0_0 and HEAD
are close to get into tarball releases I suggest to
really move the files in the CVS repository into src.nonGPL.

If nobody objects I probably will more the

  directory ./src/raster/r.agnps50
  and the following files
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.run.html,v
    ./html/html/r.out.agnps.html,v
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.input.html,v
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.view.html,v

  into src.nonGPL/agnps/
  

  Step ii): Contact the AGNPS people for clarification
      of the copyright.
     http://www.sedlab.olemiss.edu/agnps.html

I found out that the original source from Purdue
  AGNPS 1.1, see the link from
  http://www.geog.uni-hannover.de/phygeo/grass/agnps.html
contains a file called PERMISSION in the directory /programs/r.agnps
which contains emails that somehow allow the integration in GRASS,
however there is no real license (permission to release the source
code as Free Software) which would be needed.

Here some quotes,
however follows up on this should certainly try to find
and contact Raghavan Srinivasan or Bernard Engel.

  From: James Darrell McCauley <mccauley@ecn.purdue.edu>

  From: srin@brcsun0.tamu.edu (Srin)
  To: mccauley@ecn.purdue.edu
  Subject: Re: GRASS and simulation models
  Date: Thu, 19 Jan 1995 20:36:19 -0600

  I don't have any problem of releasing agnps interface with grass,

  THanks and can you let me know if you are able to contribute to the
  GRASS community.

6

On Wed, Oct 08, 2003 at 01:41:15AM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:

On Thu, Sep 25, 2003 at 05:45:31PM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:
> On Tue, Sep 23, 2003 at 12:07:40AM +0100, Glynn Clements wrote:
> > Bernhard Reiter wrote:

> > > We need to:
> > >
> > > a) replace ./src/include/color.h

> > Method 3:
> >
> > Delete src/include/color.h and replace its sole use in
> > src/ps.map/ps.map/cmd/vector.h with a local definition for the only
> > portion which is actually used:
> >
> > typedef struct {
> > unsigned short r, g, b;
> > } RGB;
>
> Sound good to me if "color.h" is not included somewhere else.
> Can you make the change Method 3 then?

I've done the change for releasebranch_26_april_2002_5_0_0 now.

Also done for HEAD now, Markus promised to do a build test.

7

On Wed, Oct 08, 2003 at 01:55:15AM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:

If nobody objects I probably will

                  move the

  directory ./src/raster/r.agnps50
  and the following files
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.run.html,v
    ./html/html/r.out.agnps.html,v
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.input.html,v
    ./html/html/r.agnps50.view.html,v

  into src.nonGPL/agnps/

Done now.
We could move it back if the license situation should clarify in the future.

8

Bernhard Reiter wrote:

On Wed, Oct 08, 2003 at 01:55:15AM +0200, Bernhard Reiter wrote:

> If nobody objects I probably will
                                    move the
> directory ./src/raster/r.agnps50
> and the following files
> ./html/html/r.agnps50.run.html,v
> ./html/html/r.out.agnps.html,v
> ./html/html/r.agnps50.input.html,v
> ./html/html/r.agnps50.view.html,v
>
> into src.nonGPL/agnps/

Done now.
We could move it back if the license situation should clarify in the future.

Bernhard,

this should be OK and I suggest to keep it there. It is an old version
of
AGNPS and there are better versions now available (linked with
proprietary GIS).
I will try to get some advice from Bernie Engel on what to do with it -
if anybody has
any plans to further develop it or use it, please let me know.

Helena

  ------------------------------------------------------------------------
   Part 1.2Type: application/pgp-signature

9

On Wed, Oct 08, 2003 at 11:07:11AM -0400, Helena Mitasova wrote:

Bernhard Reiter wrote:

> > into src.nonGPL/agnps/
>
> Done now.
> We could move it back if the license situation should clarify in the future.

this should be OK and I suggest to keep it there. It is an old
version of AGNPS and there are better versions now available
(linked with proprietary GIS).

I will try to get some advice from Bernie Engel on what to do with it -

That would be great!

if anybody has any plans to further develop it or use it, please
let me know.

I've done a call to the GRASS users list, let's watch reactions.