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>>>>> On Wed, 4 Sep 2002 16:13:24 +0100, David Carlisle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>>>> said: >> The reference to enforcement by shunning and community effort seems to >> indicate otherwise. I've been trying to read that statement from >> every angle I can think of, but I just can't find a consistent meaning >> other than that Knuth has put this in the public domain, but makes strong >> requests of the community of users of the code he wrote. > I don't think so. He states clearly that this is in violation of the > copyright notice, the bit about community pressure is an indication that > he thinks that is an effective way (as opposed to the courts) of > enforcing the rules. (It seemed to work in that case:-) I don't see that as clearly as you do. He says it's in violation of the stipulation on the copyright page of C&T:E, which isn't quite the same thing. TeX, METAFONT, and the CM fonts certainly were under his copyright at some point in the past, and there are copyright notices - From that era. Perhaps this should be taken to mean that even though they're now in the public domain, the wishes expressed in those copyright notices should still be followed? > Sadly, I don't own a copy of Computers & Typesetting vol E either. > Frank's quoted parts of it here: > http://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2002/debian-legal-200208/msg00009.html > No doubt he could quote the full text of the notice if it's thought > important. I was trying to avoid that message in particular: the last message has a grave misunderstanding of the DFSG, and the quotation from C&T:E is only indirect. Also very serious is the interpretation of "software systems that agree exactly with the program presented here." Frank seems to believe that this refers to the text of the source code... and I disagree. I think it's much more likely that this refers to an agreement at the system level, that the output is correct for all input (which of course prohibits the introduction of new features, but not more efficient algorithms which produce the same output, or translated comments). - -Brian - -- Brian Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.0.7 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQE9disW03mlJHngJfERAmuPAKCA0k8JetATksjuGPGtTyQsXJ1VwgCfc1LP UqT1f2qXeD9lzs3vKOE0tU8= =iWG3 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----