Hi Laslo, On Wed Feb 8, 2023 at 5:48 PM CET, Laslo Hunhold wrote: > On Wed, 08 Feb 2023 10:17:47 +0000 > "Tom Schwindl" <schwi...@posteo.de> wrote: > > Dear Tom, > > > I've recently (well, a few days/weeks ago) read quite a few > > discussions on a wide variety of mailing lists about whether to > > remove the range of years from the copyright notices or keep them. > > Since a few of our LICENSE files are out of date too, I wonder if > > there is a consensus on what to do. Should we update them and do the > > usual "bump the year" dance? Or should we completely drop them and > > stop worrying. I do not have strong opinions on this, but I think if > > the years are stated, they should at least be correct. > > > > I like to link to the musl discussion here since they go into more > > depth on the topic. Unfortunately, I think they didn't come to a > > conclusion: > > > > <https://www.openwall.com/lists/musl/2023/01/09/4> > > > > The reason why I bring this up is that I think it's irritating, or at > > least inconsistent, if a project is actively developed but the > > LICENSE file states something like "(c) 2010-2015". > > I also followed the hype regarding this topic, but found that it was > mostly fluff. Sure you can leave out the years, but then you're leaving > out information. > > I find the copyright years to be very helpful: They are meant to be > updated when there has been a _change_ in that timeframe as well. It's > not like you have to bump it everywhere. Looking at the license thus > gives you a short insight in who worked at the project in which > timeframe. A good example is, for instance, the dwm license file[0]. >
I like your reasoning and certainly agree with it. Thanks! As I'm reading the other replies, I did not mean to start some sort of revolution against copyright years. I was simply interested in opinions since I haven't seen the topic come up here before. I seem to always start bikeshedding discussions :-) -- Best Regards, Tom Schwindl > With best regards > > Laslo > > PS: One thing you can _really_ leave out or replace with "Copyright" is > the copyright symbol "(C)" or "©". It suffices to say "Copyright 2023 > John Doe". > > [0]:https://git.suckless.org/dwm/file/LICENSE.html
