Re: FYI: Cygnus is no longer (CNI and CYGNUS LOCAL)

[Jim Wilson <wilson at tuliptree dot org>]

On Fri, 2003-07-11 at 07:28, Tom Tromey wrote:
> Jim> I see a lot of files here that have Sun Microsystems copyrights.
> Jim> Code with Sun copyrights can't be part of gcc.
> 
> Why not?

It has always been FSF policy to require copyright assignments for code
added to GCC.  We have been a little lax in enforcing this policy.  This
needs to change.

It is OK to include some non-FSF code in the gcc repository if that
conveniently makes building gcc easier.  However, we need to be careful
to note that the code is not part of GCC in order to protect the FSF's
copyright.  For the moment, the agreed upon approach is that we have a
README file stating that the code is not part of gcc but is included for
convenience.  Also we list it as an upstream package and document the
rules for modifying the code, thereby helping make it clear that this
isn't part of gcc.

For code that we include, but aren't actively developing, this is likely
to be enough.  However, if we are actively developing code as part of
gcc, releasing it as part of gcc, and we don't have copyright
assignments for it, then we have a problem.  libffi seems to be in this
category.  In this case, adding some documentation may not be a
sufficient solution.  This is something I should discuss in a different
thread though with a more appropriate subject line.

Jim