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Incorrect license detection #2777

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chinyeungli opened this issue Dec 7, 2021 · 7 comments · Fixed by #2811
Closed

Incorrect license detection #2777

chinyeungli opened this issue Dec 7, 2021 · 7 comments · Fixed by #2811
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@chinyeungli
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Description

This is the Debian GNU/Linux prepackaged version of GNU tar.  GNU
tar, heavily based on John Gilmore's public domain version of tar,
was originally written by Graham Todd.  It is now maintained by
Paul Eggert <eggert@twinsun.com>.

This package is maintained for Debian by Bdale Garbee <bdale@gag.com>, and
was built from the sources found at:

	ftp://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/tar/

More recently, I'm directly using the upstream source repository at 

	http://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/tar.git

GNU tar is 

   Copyright (C) 1988, 1992, 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000,
   2001, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

   This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
   under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
   Free Software Foundation; either version 3, or (at your option) any later
   version.

On Debian GNU/Linux systems, the complete text of the GNU General Public 
License version 3 can be found in /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL-3.

The Debian packaging is 

   Copyright (C) 2006, 2007 Bdale Garbee <bdale@gag.com>

   This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
   under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the
   Free Software Foundation; either version 2, or (at your option) any later
   version.

On Debian GNU/Linux systems, the complete text of the GNU General Public 
License version 2 can be found in /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL-2.

The above notice from https://metadata.ftp-master.debian.org/changelogs//main/t/tar/tar_1.30+dfsg-6_copyright has public-domain detected

      "license_expressions": [
        "public-domain",
        "gpl-3.0-plus",
        "gpl-2.0-plus"
      ],

The public-domain is detected from based on John Gilmore's public domain version of tar,. Not sure can the tool be smart enough to tell public-domain is actually not the license for this package.

@chinyeungli chinyeungli added the bug label Dec 7, 2021
KevinJi22 added a commit to KevinJi22/scancode-toolkit that referenced this issue Jan 25, 2022
Adds a false positive rule for GNU tar. Fixes aboutcode-org#2777

Signed-off-by: Kevin Ji <kyji1011@gmail.com>
@pombredanne
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@chinyeungli @KevinJi22 @DennisClark @mjherzog in connection to #2811 (comment) ... is this above

... heavily based on John Gilmore's public domain version of tar, ...

a proper public-domain statement or should this be ignored?

@pombredanne
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gentle ping. @chinyeungli @DennisClark ?

@DennisClark
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DennisClark commented Jan 31, 2022

heavily based on a public domain of anything is not really a proper indication of public-domain. It just means the authors used the public domain stuff, but are, of course, completely free to license some use of it otherwise.

KevinJi22 added a commit to KevinJi22/scancode-toolkit that referenced this issue Jan 31, 2022
Adds a false positive rule for GNU tar. Fixes aboutcode-org#2777

Signed-off-by: Kevin Ji <kyji1011@gmail.com>
KevinJi22 added a commit to KevinJi22/scancode-toolkit that referenced this issue Jan 31, 2022
This removes the public domain license that was previously one of the
expected outputs of the Debian Slim Copyright license detection test.
The public domain license is not an actual license for this GNU tar
file.

Signed-off-by: Kevin Ji <kyji1011@gmail.com>
@pombredanne
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@DennisClark Thanks!

pombredanne added a commit that referenced this issue Feb 1, 2022
@pombredanne
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Fixed by @KevinJi22 with #2811

@KevinJi22 did you add your name to the AUTHORS.rst file?

@KevinJi22
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@pombredanne yeah, I added my name in a prior pull request.

@pombredanne
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Excellent! thanks again.

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4 participants