License text in binary packages

[Tom 'spot' Callaway]

This is just a reminder: YOU MUST PUT THE LICENSE TEXT as a %doc in your
Fedora Extra packages. Even perl packages. The only exception to this is
when the package is Public Domain, and even then, if there is some text
file that says as much, you should include it as %doc.

Specifically, concern was raised that the GPL did not require this. Greg
took this specific question to Red Hat Legal, and their response was
that it is a requirement of the GPL that either the full 
license or the link to the license be included -- but Red Hat Legal
recommend including the full license text as a best practice. They
advised us to keep this guideline as a "MUST" in the case of the GPL.

Rather than submit every possible license to legal to see whether or not
they would advice us to include the text or not, I proposed to the
Fedora Extras Steering Committee (FESCO) that we keep the guideline as
it is, and require all licenses used in a package to be included in text
format, as %doc, in the %files section of that package. The proposal
passed.

This is MUST item number 7 in the Things To Check On Review section in
the PackageReviewGuidelines:
http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/PackageReviewGuidelines#head-05a78c7ca440544397657679f87fbdbd84d9be28

This is not optional, this is the direction we're taking based on review
with Red Hat Legal.

Fedora Core packagers: I don't have control over how you make your
packages (yet!) but you should also strongly consider doing this. 

Fedora Extras packagers: Please audit your own packages and make changes
where necessary.

Fedora Extras reviewers: Please do not approve packages that are missing
license text(s).

If you have any questions about this, please feel free to contact me
(either publicly or privately).

Thanks,

~spot
-- 
Tom "spot" Callaway: Red Hat Senior Sales Engineer || GPG ID: 93054260
Fedora Extras Steering Committee Member (RPM Standards and Practices)
Aurora Linux Project Leader: http://auroralinux.org
Lemurs, llamas, and sparcs, oh my!