On Sun, Feb 04, 2024 at 05:38:57AM +0000, Muhammad Yaaseen wrote:

we see that the copyright for libboost debian packages are 2MB each and
are all the same. as per https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html section 12.5<https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html%20section%2012.5> we are not allowed to create symbolic links. the doubt I have is whether
I can hardlink these files and reduce the memory utilization.

This isn't really a legal question; as a practical matter, it is not
possible to ship cross-package hardlinks in .deb packages.

--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developer https://www.debian.org/ [email protected] [email protected]

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On Sun, Feb 04, 2024 at 10:50:43AM +0000, Muhammad Yaaseen wrote:

The question is once we install the libboost .deb packages into a system,
the copyright file for each libboost package is stored separately in /usr/shared/doc/packages folder. I'm think of hardlinking these copyright files so that we same some memory. Is this legally allowed.

Sorry, but this is also not a mailing list for providing legal advice to end users. If you are concerned about the legality of what you are doing downstream of Debian, you should consult your own lawyer.

-----Original Message-----
From: Steve Langasek <[email protected]>
Sent: Sunday, February 4, 2024 3:07 PM
To: Muhammad Yaaseen <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: hard linking libboost copyright files

On Sun, Feb 04, 2024 at 05:38:57AM +0000, Muhammad Yaaseen wrote:

we see that the copyright for libboost debian packages are 2MB each
and are all the same. as per https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html section 12.5<https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html%20section%2 012.5> we are not allowed to create symbolic links. the doubt I have
is whether I can hardlink these files and reduce the memory
utilization.

This isn't really a legal question; as a practical matter, it is not possible to ship cross-package hardlinks in .deb packages.

--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developer https://www.debian.org/ [email protected] [email protected]

--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world. Ubuntu Developer https://www.debian.org/ [email protected] [email protected]

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On 2024-02-04 Muhammad Yaaseen <[email protected]> wrote:

The question is once we install the libboost .deb packages into a
system, the copyright file for each libboost package is stored
separately in /usr/shared/doc/packages folder. I'm think of
hardlinking these copyright files so that we same some memory. Is this legally allowed.

[...]

The canonical solution would be to add libboost-commonx.xx containing
what is currently found in /usr/share/doc/libboost-foox.xx and symlink
the whole directory. You'll probably need to make libboost-commonx.xx
arch all to be binNMU compatible.

cu Andreas
--
`What a good friend you are to him, Dr. Maturin. His other friends are
so grateful to you.'
`I sew his ears on from time to time, sure'

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On 2024-02-04 Andreas Metzler <[email protected]> wrote:
[...]

The canonical solution would be to add libboost-commonx.xx containing
what is currently found in /usr/share/doc/libboost-foox.xx and symlink
the whole directory. You'll probably need to make libboost-commonx.xx
arch all to be binNMU compatible.

^^^

arch *any* obviously, not "all".

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Andreas Metzler <[email protected]> writes:

On 2024-02-04 Muhammad Yaaseen <[email protected]> wrote:

The question is once we install the libboost .deb packages into a
system, the copyright file for each libboost package is stored
separately in /usr/shared/doc/packages folder. I'm think of
hardlinking these copyright files so that we same some memory. Is this
legally allowed.

[...]

The canonical solution would be to add libboost-commonx.xx containing
what is currently found in /usr/share/doc/libboost-foox.xx and symlink
the whole directory. You'll probably need to make libboost-commonx.xx
arch all to be binNMU compatible.

Another solution would be to add the Boost license to /usr/share/common-licenses. Running

ls /usr/share/doc/*/copyright | xargs -n 100 grep "Boost Software License" | wc -l

on my bookworm system finds it in 225 packages, of which 160 are not a libboost* package.

Cheers,
Walter Landry

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Hi,

Il 04/02/24 06:38, Muhammad Yaaseen ha scritto:

we see that the copyright for libboost debian packages are 2MB each and
are all the same. as per https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html section 12.5 <https://www.debian.org/doc/debian-policy/ch-docs.html%20section%2012.5>
we are not allowed to create symbolic links. the doubt I have is whether
I can hardlink these files and reduce the memory utilization.

As one of the Boost maintainers, I agree that's a problem. I wonder
whether the best way forward would rather to aggregate the copyright
data with more coarse granularity, so that the file is shorter. I am not
really sure that we need such a detailed thing. I spent considerable
time preparing that thing, but I am not sure that is the way forward.

At any rate, unfortunately I haven't had time to work on Debian packages
for some time, so the situation is still unsolved.

Gio.

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