[l2h] latex2html non-free?

[Roland Stigge]

[forwarding after sending just to nikos at cbl.leeds.ac.uk and matsd at sssk.se]

Hi,

at Debian, we would have to remove the package latex2html from our
distribution because of license issues we consider non-free [1] if the
license doesn't change. Please consider releasing latex under a license
suitable for Free Software / Open Source distributions.

The license parts in question are:

floatflt.ins (by Mats Dahlgren):
%  Copyright (c) 1994-1998 by Mats Dahlgren <matsd at sssk.se>, 
%  http://www.homenet.se/matsd/ .  All rights reserved.
%
%  You may use the `floatflt' package freely, but at your own
%  risk.  The authors of floatflt.dtx and floatflt.ins (the
%  complete `floatflt' package distribution) can not be held
%  responsible for any consequence of your using any of these
%  files, or files created from these, including hardware,
%  software, and data damage.  You may not make any changes to
%  the files floatflt.dtx or floatflt.ins.  You are allowed to make 
%  changes to the `\documentclass' and/or `\usepackage' commands 
%  of the file `floatexm.tex'.  You may incorporate
%  the code from these files in other files under different
%  names, provided the original authors are given full credit for
%  their work and that you yourself take the complaints from the
%  user(s) of your file(s).  You may freely distribute the
%  files floatflt.dtx and floatflt.ins, provided: 1. You do not
%  take money for the distribution or use of these files except
%  for a nominal charge for diskettes and postage; and 2. You
%  always distribute `floatflt.dtx' and `floatflt.ins' together
%  at the same time. 

/usr/share/doc/latex2html/copyright (by Nikos Drakos):
o  No fees or compensation are charged for use, copies, or
   access to this software. You may charge a nominal
   distribution fee for the physical act of transferring a
   copy, but you may not charge for the program itself.

Our guidelines forbid us to distribute software whose redistribution is
restricted (here: no fee is allowed at all) and changes are not allowed.
It would be nice to have latex2html licensed under a free (in our sense)
license, e.g. the GPL. At least, free redistribution and modification
(and in turn, its redistribution) would be needed.

Thanks for considering.

Roland Stigge
Debian Project

[1] http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=204684
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