[tex-live] linguex in texlive snapshot

Robin Fairbairns Robin.Fairbairns at cl.cam.ac.uk
Wed Aug 13 22:21:41 CEST 2008


Manuel Pégourié-Gonnard <mpg at elzevir.fr> wrote:
> Robin Fairbairns scripsit (13.08.2008 17:14)
> > Manuel Pégourié-Gonnard <mpg at elzevir.fr> wrote:
> > 
> >> You can see that supposed obsolescence is not in the reasons. By the way, I'm
> >> not sure lack of space is still a possible reason either, now that we don't
> >> try to fit in a single CD any more.
> > 
> > as i've already said, i don't believe the gb4e stuff ought to be on tex
> > live at all.
> 
> Oh, the licences problem again.  Well, I don't think it's good to rm things
> form TL without contacting the author and asking him to clarify if the status
> is just noinfo and the stuff is not clearly non-free.  And this takes time as
> you probably know very well.  I'm not sure I want to do this right know...
> Putting the thing on my list anyway.

i don't believe there's a choice.  any author who wants can declare that
a package is available for use in distributions such as tl (or miktex).
suppose that an author didn't think of it, but when he finds his/her
package on tex live, he/she is enraged: but the first we hear of it is
when the lawyers appear at the door.

in short, if it's agreed that a package got in to tl by mistake, then it
has to come out again.  the author can restore the situation later, but
in the short term the thing has to go.  (this happened recently with the
cryst fonts.)

> > i've discussed with karl the need for sorting these "unknown" licence
> > statements in the catalogue: gb4e is one of those packages that will (in
> > the new world) be classified as "noinfo" (i.e., no information provided
> > about licensing conditions).
> 
> By the way, it would be great to share efforts concerning this licence thing.
>  It's obviously a huge task, and it would be bad to double or triple-check
> some packages just because the TL peoples don't know what has been checked by
> the Ctan people or vice-versa. (The Debian guys are also interested in
> comprehensive licence check I think, and maybe others linux/bsd/whatever
> distro may be interested in it.)
> 
> What do you (Robin, ctan-ers, Karl, others) think of discussing a
> collaborative structure to share information about what is to be done, what
> has already been done, author contacts, etc. some day in the near future?

first, we can't "just" share author contacts ... in today's world of
organised crime attempting to "break" the internet by filling all our
bandwidth with spam.

so any such collaboration has to be closed.  having said which, i've
already made moves to share catalogue information (as you know).

so i'm all in favour of sharing, although the state of my health is such
that i can't in all honesty take on the job of setting something up.

(of course, i _do_ have to work: somehow pulling the extensive notes i
have into a shape that it's possible to share...  it's just that in the
present situation, my usual incompetence at organisation is enhanced
by a frightening factor.  :-( )

robin


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