Making packages for Debian requires quite a lot of attention to +details. And one of the details is the content of the +debian/copyright file, which should list all relevant licenses used by +the code in the package in question, preferably in +machine +readable DEP5 format.
+ +For large packages with lots of contributors it is hard to write +and update this file manually, and if you get some detail wrong, the +package is normally rejected by the ftpmasters. So getting it right +the first time around get the package into Debian faster, and save +both you and the ftpmasters some work.. Today, while trying to figure +out what was wrong with +the +zfsonlinux copyright file, I decided to spend some time on +figuring out the options for doing this job automatically, or at least +semi-automatically.
+ +Lucikly, there are at least two tools available for generating the +file based on the code in the source package, +debmake +and cme. I'm +not sure which one of them came first, but both seem to be able to +create a sensible draft file. As far as I can tell, none of them can +be trusted to get the result just right, so the content need to be +polished a bit before the file is OK to upload. I found the debmake +option in +a +blog posts from 2014. + +
To generate using debmake, use the -cc option: + +
+debmake -cc > debian/copyright ++ +
Note there are some problems with python and non-ASCII names, so +this might not be the best option.
+ +The cme option is based on a config parsing library, and I found +this approach in +a +blog post from 2015. To generate using cme, use the 'update +dpkg-copyright' option: + +
+cme update dpkg-copyright ++ +
This will create or update debian/copyright. The cme tool seem to +handle UTF-8 names better than debmake.
+ +When the copyright file is created, I would also like some help to +check if the file is correct. For this I found two good options, +debmake -k and license-reconcile. The former seem +to focus on license types and file matching, and is able to detect +ineffective blocks in the copyright file. The latter reports missing +copyright holders and years, but was confused by inconsistent license +names (like CDDL vs. CDDL-1.0). I suspect it is good to use both and +fix all issues reported by them before uploading. But I do not know +if the tools and the ftpmasters agree on what is important to fix in a +copyright file, so the package might still be rejected.
+ +The devscripts tool licensecheck deserve mentioning. It +will read through the source and try to find all copyright statements. +It is not comparing the result to the content of debian/copyright, but +can be useful when verifying the content of the copyright file.
+ +Are you aware of better tools in Debian to create and update +debian/copyright file. Please let me know, or blog about it on +planet.debian.org.
+ +As usual, if you use Bitcoin and want to show your support of my +activities, please send Bitcoin donations to my address +15oWEoG9dUPovwmUL9KWAnYRtNJEkP1u1b.
+ +Update 2016-02-20: I got a tip from Mike Gabriel +on how to use licensecheck and cdbs to create a draft copyright file + +
+licensecheck --copyright -r `find * -type f` | \ + /usr/lib/cdbs/licensecheck2dep5 > debian/copyright.auto ++ +
He mentioned that he normally check the generated file into the +version control system to make it easier to discover license and +copyright changes in the upstream source. I will try to do the same +with my packages in the future.
+ +Update 2016-02-21: The cme author recommended +against using -quiet for new users, so I removed it from the proposed +command line.
+ +