1 |
Here is another small update of the copyright GLEP, resulting from a |
2 |
recent discussion on IRC. This is not a change of policy, but merely |
3 |
a clarification of the real name requirement: |
4 |
|
5 |
- The Signed-off-by line must contain the name of a natural person. |
6 |
|
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- A copyright holder can be a legal entity (e.g., a company) in some |
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jurisdictions. |
9 |
|
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Below is a diff to the previous (approved) version, followed by the |
11 |
GLEP's full text. |
12 |
|
13 |
Ulrich |
14 |
|
15 |
|
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diff --git a/glep-0076.rst b/glep-0076.rst |
17 |
index 4c0ffcb..4f9479b 100644 |
18 |
--- a/glep-0076.rst |
19 |
+++ b/glep-0076.rst |
20 |
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@ Type: Informational |
21 |
Status: Accepted |
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Version: 1 |
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Created: 2013-04-23 |
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-Last-Modified: 2018-09-15 |
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+Last-Modified: 2018-09-26 |
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Post-History: 2018-06-10, 2018-06-19, 2018-08-31 |
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Content-Type: text/x-rst |
28 |
--- |
29 |
@@ -133,9 +133,9 @@ with the project's license. |
30 |
|
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For commits made using a VCS, the committer shall certify agreement to |
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the Certificate of Origin by adding ``Signed-off-by: Name <e-mail>`` |
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-to the commit message as a separate line. Committers must use their |
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-real name, i.e., the name that would appear in an official document |
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-like a passport. |
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+to the commit message as a separate line. The sign-off must contain |
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+the committer's legal name as a natural person, i.e., the name that |
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+would appear in a government issued document. |
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|
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The following is the current Gentoo Certificate of Origin, revision 1: |
41 |
|
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@@ -197,6 +197,9 @@ author, or the contributor holding copyright to the largest portion |
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of the file. Additional copyright holders can be listed, but this is |
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normally not required. The "and others" text may be omitted if the |
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explicitly listed contributors hold copyright to the entire file. |
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+In some jurisdictions, the copyright holder can also be a company or |
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+other legal entity, and therefore be different from the original |
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+author. |
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|
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Anyone finding a file out of compliance should file a bug against the |
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associated project/package providing as much information as possible. |
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@@ -235,7 +238,8 @@ The copyright model is built on the DCO model used by the Linux kernel |
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and requires all contributors to certify the legitimacy of their |
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contributions. This also requires that they use their real name for |
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signing; an anonymous certification or one under a pseudonym would not |
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-mean anything. |
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+mean anything. This policy is derived from the Linux project's policy |
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+[#SUBMITTING-PATCHES]_. |
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|
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In the future, a second stage of this policy may use a combination of |
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the DCO model and an FLA model [#FLA]_ as it is used by different open |
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@@ -366,6 +370,11 @@ References |
63 |
.. [#FLA] FSFE Legal: Fiduciary Licence Agreement (FLA), |
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https://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html |
65 |
|
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+.. [#SUBMITTING-PATCHES] Submitting patches: the essential guide to |
67 |
+ getting your code into the kernel, |
68 |
+ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst?h=v4.18#n460 |
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+ https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=af45f32d25cc1e374184675eadc9f740221d8392 |
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+ |
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.. [#CC-SOFTWARE] Can I apply a Creative Commons license to software? |
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https://creativecommons.org/faq/#can-i-apply-a-creative-commons-license-to-software |
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|
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|
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|
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--- |
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GLEP: 76 |
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Title: Copyright Policy |
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Author: Richard Freeman <rich0@g.o>, |
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Alice Ferrazzi <alicef@g.o>, |
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Ulrich Müller <ulm@g.o>, |
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Robin H. Johnson <robbat2@g.o>, |
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Michał Górny <mgorny@g.o> |
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Type: Informational |
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Status: Accepted |
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Version: 1 |
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Created: 2013-04-23 |
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Last-Modified: 2018-09-26 |
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Post-History: 2018-06-10, 2018-06-19, 2018-08-31 |
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Content-Type: text/x-rst |
91 |
--- |
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|
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|
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Status |
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====== |
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|
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Accepted by the Gentoo Council on 2018-09-09 and approved by the |
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Gentoo Board of Trustees on 2018-09-15. Implementation in tools |
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(e.g., repoman) is pending. |
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|
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|
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Abstract |
103 |
======== |
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|
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This GLEP introduces a copyright and licensing policy for Gentoo |
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projects. It requires all contributions of software or documentation |
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to be released under a free license, and to be accompanied by a |
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certificate of origin. |
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|
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|
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Motivation |
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========== |
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|
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The copyright ownership of Gentoo materials is ambiguous due to |
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historical factors, and this GLEP attempts to improve the process |
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going forward. |
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|
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In the beginning (2000 or earlier), the copyright header stated that |
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*Gentoo Technologies, Inc.* was the copyright holder, without any |
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formal paperwork. The formal assignment document was however only |
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introduced in early 2004. The assignment had many objectors (mostly |
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on the ``gentoo-core`` mailing list). The developer recruiting |
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procedures attempted to require signing of the document as a condition |
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for becoming a developer, but it was not applied to pre-existing |
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developers, or those that objected. |
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|
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Later, the *Gentoo Foundation* was established, and copyrights were |
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formally transferred (including nullifying original developer |
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assignments to *Gentoo Technologies, Inc.*), and the copyright header |
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was updated. The formal assignment document text was updated in 2006, |
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but the formal assignment process had already been abandoned in |
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mid-2004. |
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|
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Throughout this, the presence of copyright headers existed as a |
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policy, and continues to exist to this day. Some files also still |
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contain or have in the past contained additional copyright headers, |
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attributing ownership to other parties. |
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|
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The policy to have copyright notices ascribing copyright ownership to |
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the Gentoo Foundation caused an issue when Gentoo developers forked |
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another project and hosted the fork on Gentoo infrastructure. To |
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comply with the previous policy the copyright notices were modified, |
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which caused concerns with the project the files were forked from. |
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Our previous policy completely neglected the possibility that Gentoo |
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might want to host files that were not created internally. |
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|
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Finally, since the early days of Gentoo new ideas around copyright |
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licensing have become more popular, such as the FSFE's Fiduciary |
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License Agreement [#FLA]_, which takes a copyleft approach to |
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copyright licensing, while also better complying with copyright laws |
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in nations that have author's rights. |
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|
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The goal here was to create a policy that was flexible enough to cover |
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forks and situations where Gentoo would not own the majority of the |
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copyright in a file. |
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|
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|
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Specification |
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============= |
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|
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Purpose / Scope |
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--------------- |
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|
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This policy documents how Gentoo contributors comply and document |
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copyright for any contributions made to Gentoo. Anyone committing |
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documentation or sources to any repository hosted on Gentoo |
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infrastructure or to any official Gentoo project (independently |
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of hosting) must comply with this policy. Unofficial Gentoo projects |
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are also recommended to use this policy. |
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|
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Questions regarding this policy should be directed to the Trustees |
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or the ``gentoo-project`` mailing list. Any concerns over possible |
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copyright violations should be directed to the Trustees if they cannot |
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be worked out with the appropriate maintainer. |
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|
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|
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Licensing of Gentoo Projects |
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---------------------------- |
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|
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Every Gentoo project must abide by the Gentoo Social Contract |
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[#SOCIAL-CONTRACT]_ and release its work under one or more of the |
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following: |
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|
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a) The GNU General Public License, version 2 or later (GPL-2+) |
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[#GPL-2]_. |
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|
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b) The Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License |
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(CC-BY-SA-4.0, only for documentation) [#CC-BY-SA-4.0]_. |
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Existing projects may also stay with CC-BY-SA-3.0 [#CC-BY-SA-3.0]_. |
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|
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c) A license approved as GPL compatible by the Free Software |
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Foundation [#GPL-COMPAT]_. |
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|
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Exceptions for other free software licenses will be granted by the |
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Gentoo Foundation on a case by case basis. |
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|
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For easy reference, the license for each project should be documented |
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on the wiki page at [#PROJECTS]_. |
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|
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|
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Certificate of Origin |
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--------------------- |
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|
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All commits to Gentoo project repositories shall be accompanied by a |
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certificate of origin. The purpose of the certificate is to declare |
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that the contribution can be modified and redistributed in accordance |
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with the project's license. |
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|
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For commits made using a VCS, the committer shall certify agreement to |
210 |
the Certificate of Origin by adding ``Signed-off-by: Name <e-mail>`` |
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to the commit message as a separate line. The sign-off must contain |
212 |
the committer's legal name as a natural person, i.e., the name that |
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would appear in a government issued document. |
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|
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The following is the current Gentoo Certificate of Origin, revision 1: |
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|
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By making a contribution to this project, I certify that: |
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|
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1. The contribution was created in whole or in part by me, and I |
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have the right to submit it under the free software license |
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indicated in the file; or |
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|
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2. The contribution is based upon previous work that, to the best |
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of my knowledge, is covered under an appropriate free software |
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license, and I have the right under that license to submit that |
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work with modifications, whether created in whole or in part by |
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me, under the same free software license (unless I am permitted |
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to submit under a different license), as indicated in the file; |
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or |
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|
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3. The contribution is a license text (or a file of similar nature), |
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and verbatim distribution is allowed; or |
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|
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4. The contribution was provided directly to me by some other |
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person who certified 1., 2., 3., or 4., and I have not modified |
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it. |
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|
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I understand and agree that this project and the contribution |
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are public and that a record of the contribution (including all |
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personal information I submit with it, including my sign-off) is |
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maintained indefinitely and may be redistributed consistent with |
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this project or the free software license(s) involved. |
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|
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The Gentoo Certificate of Origin is licensed under a Creative Commons |
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Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License [#CC-BY-SA-3.0]_. |
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It is based on the Linux Kernel DCO [#OSDL-DCO]_, released by Open |
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Source Development Labs, Inc. in 2005 under a CC-BY-SA-2.5 License. |
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|
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Alternatively, and if it is applicable, committers can certify their |
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commits with the Linux Kernel DCO 1.1 [#DCO-1.1]_. This shall be |
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indicated by adding ``(DCO-1.1)`` at the end of the ``Signed-off-by`` |
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line. Using the Gentoo Certificate of Origin is strongly preferred. |
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|
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|
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Copyright Attribution |
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--------------------- |
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|
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All copyrightable files included in Gentoo projects must contain |
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appropriate copyright and license notices, as defined by this policy. |
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For files in textual format, these notices normally appear near the |
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top of the file. When technical limitations do not allow for text |
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notices in the file itself (e.g., for binary image file formats), |
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copyright and license can be stated in an accompanying text file in |
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the same directory. |
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|
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A proper copyright notice reads:: |
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|
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Copyright YEARS MAIN-CONTRIBUTOR [OTHER-CONTRIBUTOR]... [and others] |
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|
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It must list the main copyright holder, who is usually the original |
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author, or the contributor holding copyright to the largest portion |
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of the file. Additional copyright holders can be listed, but this is |
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normally not required. The "and others" text may be omitted if the |
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explicitly listed contributors hold copyright to the entire file. |
275 |
In some jurisdictions, the copyright holder can also be a company or |
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other legal entity, and therefore be different from the original |
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author. |
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|
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Anyone finding a file out of compliance should file a bug against the |
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associated project/package providing as much information as possible. |
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Files that are not brought into compliance within 60 days or upon a |
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request for removal by a aggrieved copyright holder will be removed. |
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Any concerns not addressed by a maintainer can be appealed to the |
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Trustees. |
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|
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|
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Simplified Attribution |
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---------------------- |
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|
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Alternatively, projects are welcome to use a simplified form of the |
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copyright notice, which reads:: |
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|
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Copyright YEARS Gentoo Authors |
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|
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Projects using this scheme must track authorship in a VCS, unless they |
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list all authors of copyrightable contributions in an ``AUTHORS`` file. |
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|
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|
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Rationale |
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========= |
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|
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Policy |
303 |
------ |
304 |
|
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This document aims to provide a single consistent copyright policy for |
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all Gentoo projects. It is explicitly enforced for all official Gentoo |
307 |
projects in order to protect the interests of Gentoo as a whole, |
308 |
including its contributors, developers and users. Additionally, it is |
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enforced for all other projects hosted on Gentoo infrastructure in order |
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to protect the Gentoo infrastructure owners and improve consistency. |
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|
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The copyright model is built on the DCO model used by the Linux kernel |
313 |
and requires all contributors to certify the legitimacy of their |
314 |
contributions. This also requires that they use their real name for |
315 |
signing; an anonymous certification or one under a pseudonym would not |
316 |
mean anything. This policy is derived from the Linux project's policy |
317 |
[#SUBMITTING-PATCHES]_. |
318 |
|
319 |
In the future, a second stage of this policy may use a combination of |
320 |
the DCO model and an FLA model [#FLA]_ as it is used by different open |
321 |
source projects. Contributors would be able to freely choose whether |
322 |
they sign the FLA document or not. |
323 |
|
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|
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Licensing of Projects |
326 |
--------------------- |
327 |
|
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The Social Contract mentions GPL-2 and CC-BY-SA-2.0, both with the |
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option to use them in a later version ("at our discretion"). In order |
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to facilitate interchange of software between different projects, we |
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aim for uniformity of their licensing. Therefore, items a) and b) |
332 |
explicitly recommend the use of GPL-2+ and CC-BY-SA-4.0. The latter |
333 |
is restricted to be used for documentation, because Creative Commons |
334 |
themselves recommend against using their licenses for software |
335 |
[#CC-SOFTWARE]_. |
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|
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Other GPL-compatible free software licenses that are not explicitly |
338 |
listed are allowed by item c). This covers cases where compatibility |
339 |
to licenses used by upstream projects is necessary. (For example, |
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the Gentoo BSD project may want to use the 2-clause or 3-clause BSD |
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license). |
342 |
|
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By default, GPL-incompatible licenses (e.g., the CDDL) are not |
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allowed, because their use would hinder interchange of code between |
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Gentoo projects. However, the Foundation can grant exceptions to |
346 |
this, as long as the license in question is a free software or open |
347 |
source license. |
348 |
|
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|
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Changes to the Certificate of Origin |
351 |
------------------------------------ |
352 |
|
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The Gentoo Certificate of Origin rev. 1 has been based on Linux Kernel |
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DCO 1.1 [#OSDL-DCO]_. It features the following modifications from |
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the original: |
356 |
|
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i. The enumeration has been modified to use numeric points. |
358 |
|
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ii. Additional point 3. has been inserted: |
360 |
|
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3. The contribution is a license text (or a file of similar |
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nature), and verbatim distribution is allowed; or |
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|
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iii. The original point (c) has shifted to become point 4., and has |
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been updated to account for the additional point 3. |
366 |
|
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iv. The original point (d) has been transformed into a stand-alone |
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paragraph following the enumeration. |
369 |
|
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v. The term "open source" has been replaced by "free software" |
371 |
throughout. |
372 |
|
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The new point was deemed necessary to allow committing license files |
374 |
into the Gentoo repository, since those files usually do not permit |
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modification. It has been established that adding a clear provision |
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for this case is better than excluding those commits from compliance |
377 |
with the Certificate of Origin. Debian was facing a similar problem |
378 |
[#DEBIAN-LICENSE]_. |
379 |
|
380 |
The update of point (c) was necessary to allow the new clause being |
381 |
certified by the person providing the contribution. |
382 |
|
383 |
The term "free software" is used for consistency with the language |
384 |
of the Gentoo Social Contract [#SOCIAL-CONTRACT]_. |
385 |
|
386 |
The remaining changes were merely editorial. The original point (d) |
387 |
is not part of the *or* statement joining the other points, so keeping |
388 |
it in a paragraph separate from the enumeration is more appropriate. |
389 |
|
390 |
Addition of another point for public domain material was also |
391 |
considered. However, it is preferred if all contributions carry |
392 |
an explicit license notice that allows their certification under |
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point 1. or 2. If necessary, license tools like Creative Commons |
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CC0 [#CC0-1.0]_ or Public Domain Mark [#CC-PDM-1.0]_ can be used. |
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|
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|
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Copyright Notice |
398 |
---------------- |
399 |
|
400 |
Especially for ebuild repositories, constantly keeping track of the |
401 |
main copyright holder of any file would be rather inconvenient and |
402 |
tedious. Therefore, projects are free to use either a traditional |
403 |
copyright notice listing the individual author(s), or a simplified |
404 |
notice with an attribution to the "Gentoo Authors". The latter |
405 |
resembles the scheme used by the Chromium project [#CHROMIUM]_. |
406 |
|
407 |
|
408 |
Acknowledgements |
409 |
================ |
410 |
|
411 |
Many people have participated in invaluable discussions on this GLEP. |
412 |
In particular, the authors would like to thank David Abbott, |
413 |
Roy Bamford, Kristian Fiskerstrand, Andreas K. Hüttel, Manuel Rüger, |
414 |
Matija Šuklje, Matthew Thode, and Alec Warner for their input. |
415 |
|
416 |
|
417 |
References |
418 |
========== |
419 |
|
420 |
.. [#SOCIAL-CONTRACT] Gentoo Social Contract, |
421 |
https://www.gentoo.org/get-started/philosophy/social-contract.html |
422 |
|
423 |
.. [#GPL-2] GNU General Public License, version 2 or later, |
424 |
https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html |
425 |
|
426 |
.. [#CC-BY-SA-4.0] Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 |
427 |
International License, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ |
428 |
|
429 |
.. [#CC-BY-SA-3.0] Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 |
430 |
Unported License, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ |
431 |
|
432 |
.. [#GPL-COMPAT] GPL-compatible free software licenses, |
433 |
https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#GPLCompatibleLicenses |
434 |
|
435 |
.. [#PROJECTS] Licensing of Gentoo projects, |
436 |
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Project:Licenses/Licensing_of_Gentoo_projects |
437 |
|
438 |
.. [#OSDL-DCO] Open Source Development Labs, Inc., |
439 |
Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1, |
440 |
https://web.archive.org/web/20060524185355/http://www.osdlab.org/newsroom/press_releases/2004/2004_05_24_dco.html |
441 |
|
442 |
.. [#DCO-1.1] Developer's Certificate of Origin 1.1, |
443 |
https://developercertificate.org/ |
444 |
|
445 |
.. [#FLA] FSFE Legal: Fiduciary Licence Agreement (FLA), |
446 |
https://fsfe.org/activities/ftf/fla.en.html |
447 |
|
448 |
.. [#SUBMITTING-PATCHES] Submitting patches: the essential guide to |
449 |
getting your code into the kernel, |
450 |
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/tree/Documentation/process/submitting-patches.rst?h=v4.18#n460 |
451 |
https://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/linux/kernel/git/torvalds/linux.git/commit/?id=af45f32d25cc1e374184675eadc9f740221d8392 |
452 |
|
453 |
.. [#CC-SOFTWARE] Can I apply a Creative Commons license to software? |
454 |
https://creativecommons.org/faq/#can-i-apply-a-creative-commons-license-to-software |
455 |
|
456 |
.. [#DEBIAN-LICENSE] [debian-legal] License of the GPL license, |
457 |
https://lists.debian.org/debian-legal/2018/04/msg00006.html |
458 |
|
459 |
.. [#CC0-1.0] Creative Commons: CC0 1.0 Universal, |
460 |
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ |
461 |
|
462 |
.. [#CC-PDM-1.0] Creative Commons: Public Domain Mark 1.0, |
463 |
https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/ |
464 |
|
465 |
.. [#CHROMIUM] Chromium: Contributing Code, |
466 |
https://www.chromium.org/developers/contributing-code#TOC-Legal-stuff |
467 |
|
468 |
|
469 |
Copyright |
470 |
========= |
471 |
|
472 |
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 |
473 |
Unported License. To view a copy of this license, visit |
474 |
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/. |