Re: [boost] Two minor (?) legal-related questions

Subject: Re: [boost] Two minor (?) legal-related questions
From: James Fowler (boost_list_at_[hidden])
Date: 2009-01-28 17:36:08

IANAL, but I have worked with quite a bit with both doxygen and

licensing issues. As I understand it anything related to protecting IP 
is best applied as consistently as possible.  Aesthetically, I'd prefer 
to have the doxygen block first, but that might add some (admittedly 
small) amount of risk.   If it was just a copyright statement, it would 
probably be too trivial to bother, but referring to an external license 
agreement is a more complex issue.   I'm not really sure it matters, but 
I'm 99.88% certain that if it does matter, it's best to always have the 
copyright / license block at the very beginning.

My $0.02 : doxygen's more flexible than lawyers, keep the 
copyright/license block first.  FWIW, that's how I format my own code, 
even though I think it's uglier.  .

- James

Paul A. Bristow wrote:
>   
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: boost-bounces_at_[hidden] [mailto:boost-bounces_at_[hidden]]
>>     
> On
>   
>> Behalf Of Niels Dekker - mail address until 2010-10-10
>> Sent: 28 January 2009 15:13
>> To: boost_at_[hidden]
>> Subject: Re: [boost] Two minor (?) legal-related questions (empty
>>     
> linesand"Boost
>   
>> sponsorship")
>>
>> Gennaro Prota wrote:
>>     
>>> the "how to apply to source files" entry at
>>>   <http://www.boost.org/users/license.html>
>>> asks to leave an empty line before and after the comment block
>>> which contains copyright notice and license reference. I'm
>>> wondering if that was an advice from the lawyers who wrote the
>>> license or just a stylistic preference.
>>>       
>> Beman Dawes wrote:
>>     
>>> Stylistic.
>>>       
>> Thomas Klimpel wrote:
>>     
>>> So the inspection report tool will not be affected by missing empty
>>> lines?
>>>       
>> And would it be okay to have the comment block located /after/ the
>> include guard macro?  For my personal header files I prefer to have the
>> include-guard defined at the very first line.  Which makes life easier
>> when I need to dive into the preprocessor output...
>>     
>
> Well - what about Doxygen comments like
>
> /*!
>   \file svg_2d_plot.hpp
>   \brief Create 2D plots in Scalable Vector Graphic (SVG) format.
>   \author Jacob Voytko & Paul A. Bristow
>  */
>
> // Copyright Jacob Voytko 2007
> // Copyright Paul A. Bristow 2007, 2008, 2009
>
> // Use, modification and distribution are subject to the
> // Boost Software License, Version 1.0.
> // (See accompanying file LICENSE_1_0.txt
> // or copy at http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt)
>
> #ifndef BOOST_SVG_SVG_2D_PLOT_HPP
> #define BOOST_SVG_SVG_2D_PLOT_HPP
>
> ....
>
> This *feels* as though it should come first?
>
> But I think that a consistent recommended style is the key thing.
>
> Paul
>
> ---
> Paul A. Bristow
> Prizet Farmhouse
> Kendal, UK   LA8 8AB
> [phone], mobile [phone]
> pbristow_at_[hidden]
>
>
>
>
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>   

-- 
______________________________________________
      James Fowler,  Open Sea Consulting
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