gbranden pushed a commit to branch master
in repository groff.
commit 738d7a66e3e8e37d98e1ce3a35433fcbc420aeb7
Author: G. Branden Robinson <[email protected]>
AuthorDate: Fri Mar 6 16:15:34 2026 -0600
xtotroff(1): Update copyright notice.
* Add copyright notice for myself. I have never executed copyright
assignment paperwork with the FSF, so my "legally significant"[1]
changes to this file can't be under the FSF's copyright.
Justification (year, commit ID, summary, net lines added by commit):
2024 89283b0935 Make more commands' exit status 2 on usage error. [+15]
2023 a9767ace3d [man pages]: Define page-local `MR` fallback. [+15]
2021 da17a00b78 xtotroff(1): Clarify. [+32]
* Ratchet back year of FSF copyright notice to 2004 (only), reflecting
the date of the last "legally significant"[ibid.] contribution to this
file by anyone but me, which was its introduction by Werner Lemberg in
commit 13ab2c3ce4, 2004-11-25.
(Bernd Warken's commit dfd5335c31, 2014-09-18, is a sadly complex
case. It adds 31 lines net, which would be "legally significant", but
is summarized as "Improve the license information", which would
vitiate that significance. However, the committed change does not
restrict itself to that purpose. It also adds comment banners and
empty requests and makes other cosmetic changes. I think the balance
of the analysis is solidly against significance, but a good commit
discipline relieves maintainers of having to undertake it.)
* Drop ersatz copyright symbol '(C)'.
Software developers have long labored under the no-longer-correct
misconception that omitting a copyright symbol from one's notice was a
fatal defect that effectively placed the work in the public domain.
That stopped being true as of 1 March 1989.[2] Further, prior to
guidance issued by the U.S. Copyright Office in the decades since, the
use of "(C)" as a substitute for a copyright sign _may not have
sufficed_ to prevent the copyright notice from being regarded as
defective. The Copyright Office, then and now, prefers the
abbreviation "copr." when © is typographically unavailable.[ibid.]
Nowadays, its advice is that "c" (note lowercase) is an "acceptable
variant", that _may_ retain the efficacy of the copyright notice. The
word "copyright", spelled out in full, also suffices per that
resource, and is already present in this notice.
[1] See groff's "HACKING" file, section "Updating Copyright Notices".
---
src/utils/xtotroff/xtotroff.1.man | 3 ++-
1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
diff --git a/src/utils/xtotroff/xtotroff.1.man
b/src/utils/xtotroff/xtotroff.1.man
index be4ca0a4a..8017d63be 100644
--- a/src/utils/xtotroff/xtotroff.1.man
+++ b/src/utils/xtotroff/xtotroff.1.man
@@ -9,7 +9,8 @@ font metrics
.\" Legal Terms
.\" ====================================================================
.\"
-.\" Copyright (C) 2004-2024 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
+.\" Copyright 2004 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
+.\" 2021-2024 G. Branden Robinson
.\"
.\" Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this
.\" manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are
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