[OSGeo-Standards] OGC XML schemas and FOSS4G softwaredistribution

[Greg Troxel]

Jody Garnett <jody.garnett at gmail.com> writes:

> I think we better ask around for a contact at Debian (perhaps the person
> who reviewed pycsw can be approached?). Failing that we could review what
> the w3c has written which is apparently successful.

I'm not from Debian, but this issue is not really about Debian.  It's
about whether OGC software/data have a Free Software or Open Source
license, which at least Debian and pkgsrc care about.

pkgsrc's rules are that in order to build by default (without the user
having to add a license to an acceptable list) a license must either
have been approved by the FSF as Free or by the OSI as Open Source.
Debian's rules are that the license must meet the Debian Free Software
Guidelines:
  http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines
which is not the same as the other two but similar in spirit.

One clause (in section 4) about "protecting the integrity of the
author's work" is:

  The license may require derived works to carry a different name or
  version number from the original software.

I assume this is the OGC's concern - that modified works not end up
getting used by people who don't realize they are modified.  So a
license which grants permission to copy/modify/distribute but with the
restriction that modified works must have a different package name and a
different scheme name should be acceptable.  There is precedent for this
in separating software licenses under copyright law from trademark law.


All that said, I would be highly suprised if any packaging system wanted
to make substantive changes to such a package.  Generally, the notion is
that any changes are sent back to be incorporated upstream, and patches
only accumulate in distributions from non-responsive upstreams.

Greg
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