Am 20.05.26 um 16:57 schrieb Gunnar Wolf:
Hello Michael, Michael Stehmann dijo [Wed, May 20, 2026 at 11:28:21AM +0200]:Hello, my question is: How should Debian treats not human generated files. Starting point: An .orig.tar.[g|x]z contains files, which are not human generated.(I know that there is an discussion on debian-vote about a General Resolution "Allow AI-Assisted Contributions". But the content of files might also generated by (non AI) application (example: tools for autoconfiguration).)My assumption is that content generated by machine is not human artwork and not copyrightable.(...)Should Debian allow a pseudo copyright remark like "not copyrightable" to clarify the legal situation of the files mentioned above?Just thinking out loud here... Many files are not the _direct_ output of human actions, but the result of some transforms over it. For example, if I create a set of icons, I am not directly writing the SVG or PNG renditions. But they are directly created from my actions. It is not even an exactly repeatable action... I could show how I built a given SVG, but the result would very likely not be bit-identical. Still, we will accept SVG as the _closest we can get_ to a source document, and as a preferred form of modification.
That is true.But I don't mean files which are another form of a program like a source file and a binary. Another example is a .tex file and a PDF generated by pdflatex.
As an example: One can make a pom.xml file by Apache NetBeans automaticly. Another one creates this file with an editor.
The pom.xml is not a conversation of the java source code which is written by a person.
I mean automaticly generated files which are not only a conversation of a man's work but a replacement.
Autoconf and such files would be something similar: Across the many build systems and languages, we will find an existing, human-generated manifest. This manifest is processed, together with the running system information (which we now care to document enough for it to be reproducible!), and a “verbosified” autoconf / cargo / Makefile.PL / composer / whatever non-human-generated file is generated.
If the manifest is human work, IMO the config file is just a conversation of it and has to be distributed under the same license like the manifest file.
It is another question what the conditions are under them a program is copyrightable. (There are good reasons why Debian assumes all programs are copyrightable.)
So, given a (simpler) human-generated manifest, together with build environment information, the autoconf system works as some sort of compiler. And we often ship this compiled file for convenience — but (in principle, at least) we could just regenerate it from “real” sources. Yes, I'm oversimplifying many bits, and I know there are some procedural details that probably make my point not always valid. But would you find this a better point to work from?
Not really. We should identify case groups to distinguish between. Greetings Michael
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