[skip changelog] Standardize license file #1522
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Standardization in license documentation is important because, in addition to making it easy for humans to find this vital information, it allows machines to automate the process of license type determination, which is useful both for discovering suitable open source projects as well as checking open source license compliance. The open source license of Arduino CLI is already stored in a standardized location at `/LICENSE.txt`. However, even though Arduino CLI is licensed under the industry standard GPL 3.0 open source license, additional text was added to the license file which offers the option to purchase an exception for proprietary use of the code. Even though this offer does not have any legal effect on the GPL 3.0 license, it does make it so that the license file can no longer be identified with 100% confidence by machines as GPL 3.0, which means a human must make that identification instead. Since there is no need to place the exception offer in the license file, it can be moved to the readme and the license file left as the verbatim GPL 3.0 license text, as looked for by the license type detection tools such as licensee.
Whenever one of the recognized license file names are modified in the repository, the workflow runs to check whether the license can be recognized and whether it is of the expected type. GitHub has a useful automated license detection system that determines the license type used by a repository, and surfaces that information in the repository home page, the search web interface, and the GitHub API. This license detection system requires that the license be defined by a dedicated file with one of several standardized filenames and paths. GitHub's license detection system uses the popular licensee tool, so this file also serves to define the license type for any other usages of licensee, as well as to human readers of the file. For this reason, and to ensure it remains a valid legal instrument, it's important that there be no non-standard modifications to the license file or collisions with other supported licence files. This workflow ensures that any changes which would change the license type or which license file is used by the detection are caught automatically.
per1234
added
type: enhancement
rsora
approved these changes
Oct 20, 2021
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UPGRADING.mdhas been updated with a migration guide (for breaking changes)Documentation enhancement
Standardization in license documentation is important because, in addition to making it easy for humans to find this vital information, it allows machines to automate the process of license type determination, which is useful both for discovering suitable open source projects as well as checking open source license compliance.
The open source license of Arduino CLI is already stored in a standardized location at
/LICENSE.txt. However, even though Arduino CLI is licensed under an industry standard GPL 3.0 open source license, additional text was added to the license file which offers the option to purchase an exception for proprietary use of the code. Even though this offer does not have any legal effect on the GPL 3.0 license, it does make it so that the license file can no longer be identified with 100% confidence by machines as GPL 3.0, which means a human must make that identification instead.GitHub's automated license detection system is unable to identify the license type of the repository.
Since there is no need to place the exception offer in the license file, it is moved to the readme and the license file left as the verbatim GPL 3.0 license text, as looked for by the license type detection tools such as licensee.
The license type of the repository will now be correctly identified by GitHub and by other open source license compliance tools and services such as Licensed.
A CI workflow ensures that the project license type will continue to be detectable and detected as the intended type:
Whenever one of the recognized license file names are modified in the repository, the workflow runs licensee to check whether the license can be recognized and whether it is of the expected type.
titled accordingly?
No breaking change