Re: [Savannah-register-public] [task #11582] Submission of RFree

[Maggie Avener]

Hi,

I received a reply from the FCC confirming that their statement about 
the code applies to curves_subroutines.f as well. I updated the code to 
include a brief comment at the beginning establishing that the file was 
created by the FCC and is assumed to be in the public domain. The new 
tarball is at web.mit.edu/avenerm/www/rfree-2011-11-18.tar.gz.

I think I've addressed all of the issues with the tarball - please let 
me know if there's anything else I need to do.

Thanks!
Maggie

On 11/14/2011 06:02 PM, Karl Berry wrote:
> Hi Maggie,
>
> (Really should be doing this in the submission ticket, but oh well.)
>
>      As far as I understand from copyright law, anything written by FCC staff
>      is automatically considered public domain.
>
> That is true, assuming the "FCC staff" involved were US government
> employees.  The rules can be different for contractors.
>
>      We aren't making any official statement about the code being in the
>      "public domain."
>
> What a useless FUD-generating non-statement by them :(.
>
>      However, you are free to use the code, copy it, modify it, or
>      otherwise make it available to others via the web.
>
> That seems good enough, if they confirm it about the present file.
>
>      label it as public domain now, but change the license info to GPL 3+
>      if we make any substantial changes to it. Can you confirm?
>
> Yes, that sounds like the right thing to me too.
>
>
> Thanks,
> karl