Bug#524732: simutrans: license is not Artistic as in common-licenses

Francesco Poli (t1000) frx at firenze.linux.it
Sun Apr 19 13:47:02 UTC 2009


Package: simutrans
Version: 102.0-1
Severity: normal

Hi and thanks for maintaining Simutrans in Debian!

I noticed something awkward in the debian/copyright file.

It claims that the license for the package (except for a single font
file) is "Artistic".
Then it quotes this "Artistic" license text fully.

As soon as I saw this, I thought it should refer to
/usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic  instead and I was almost rushing
to fire up reportbug to say so...  but, then I looked closer and I
found out that the quoted license text differs from
/usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic

A gzipped wdiff output between /usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic
and the license of Simutrans (as quoted in the debian/copyright)
is attached.

Hence, it's OK that the license text is quoted in full in the
debian/copyright file, but it's *not* OK that this license is called
"Artistic", since the copyright file format specification
(http://wiki.debian.org/Proposals/CopyrightFormat?action=recall&rev=226)
defines "Artistic" as "The original Artistic license, as seen in
/usr/share/common-licenses/Artistic".

Please change the misleading label to something more appropriate
(probably "other").

Moreover, I cannot find any debian-legal thread about this modified
Artistic license for Simutrans.
Was this license analyzed in order to check that simutrans really
belongs in Debian main?  Could you point me to the relevant thread?
I fear that mislabelling the license as "Artistic" could have caused
some easy & fast "It's OK for main" conclusion...

Please clarify.
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