[fab] Fedora as Free Software?

[Matt Domsch]

On Fri, Apr 21, 2006 at 08:08:26PM -0400, seth vidal wrote:
> 
> > I'm wondering what you guys think about changing the tilt of Fedora from
> > open source to free software.  Namely, saying that the license should
> > meet the free software definition (
> >  http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html ) and then mentioning that
> > OSI-certified licenses (with the exception of the Reciprocal Public
> > License, which we're going to reevaluate) are a good list, as well as
> > the free software licenses that are listed on the FSF website.
> > 
> > The goal is to make Fedora a distribution that the FSF can positively
> > endorse.  I think we're really close.  Any reason to not try to go all
> > the way?
> 
> Do we have an idea of what we would need to drop to be completely free
> software definition compliant?
> 
> What would we lose?
> 
> I guess a few rpm queries on license should work.
> what licenses are we looking for?

At a glance of Core -devel, the following packages don't have licenses
that are explicitly on the FSF's list:

tog-pegasus	       Open Group Pegasus Open Source (motif)
tog-pegasus-devel      Open Group Pegasus Open Source	
openmotif	       Open Group Public License	
openmotif-devel	       Open Group Public License	
xorg-x11-proto-devel   The Open Group License
xorg-x11-util-macros   The Open Group License

jdepend		       Clarkware License
jdepend-demo	       Clarkware License
jdepend-javadoc	       Clarkware License

adaptx		       Exolab Software License
adaptx-doc	       Exolab Software License
adaptx-javadoc	       Exolab Software License
castor		       Exolab Software License
castor-demo	       Exolab Software License
castor-doc	       Exolab Software License
castor-javadoc	       Exolab Software License
castor-test	       Exolab Software License
castor-xml	       Exolab Software License

latex2html   Free To Use But Restricted (See LICENSE)

tanukiwrapper		 Tanuki Software License (open source)
tanukiwrapper-demo	 Tanuki Software License (open source)
tanukiwrapper-javadoc	 Tanuki Software License (open source)
tanukiwrapper-manual	 Tanuki Software License (open source)

libc-client		 University of Washington Free-Fork License
libc-client-devel	 University of Washington Free-Fork License

xdoclet			 XDoclet Open Source Licence
xdoclet-javadoc		 XDoclet Open Source Licence
xdoclet-manual		 XDoclet Open Source Licence


For that matter, none of these are on the OSI's list either explicitly.

Then there's all of the "distributable" License tags, and the packages
marked "various".

So yes, close, but not a done deal.

Thanks,
Matt