Message-Id: &lt;m0vTBre-0007rWC@i17linuxb.ists.pwr.wroc.pl&gt;
From: marekm@i17linuxb.ists.pwr.wroc.pl (Marek Michalkiewicz)
Subject: Policy, compress, and X...
To: submit@bugs.debian.org
Date: Thu, 28 Nov 1996 20:11:13 +0100 (MET)
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Package: dpkg-dev
Version: 1.4.0.3

The policy manual says: packages where &quot;the program cannot be compiled
using only packages in the main Debian distribution&quot; may only be placed
in contrib.  But, as it is now, X requires compress to build, and it is
not in the main distribution due to US patent problems.

Now, I don't think X should be placed in contrib just to meet policy
requirements, especially since (again, according to the policy manual)
any packages depending on X should then be in contrib as well...

We have several options (besides moving X to contrib):
 - relax the policy a little
 - patch X to allow use of gzipped fonts (using zlib)
 - move the distribution to a country where LZW is not patented

I guess the first option is easiest to implement right now, to make
sure that the Debian 1.2 release doesn't contradict its own policy
requirements.  Hence, I'm reporting this as a bug in the dpkg-dev
package which includes the policy manual.  Changing the policy
shouldn't break too many packages :-).

Patching X to use zlib might be a good option if we didn't have the
code freeze.  How big is the necessary patch?  It would be good,
not just due to US patents - gzip has usually better compression
and it would be nice to save some disk space.

Moving the distribution would solve a few other problems as well
(such as the ITAR munitions export restrictions), but is probably
not something that can be done very quickly.  Also, the policy
manual doesn't say: the patent/copyright laws of which country
should be used to decide if a package is freely distributable?
(I'm assuming it's the country where ftp.debian.org is located
- is this right?  It does matter...)

Marek