Hi folks,
When packaging or adopting a package, it can be useful to lookup the official
SPDX licence id to add after cygport `LICENSE=`, or check if the cygport
official SPDX licence id `LICENSE=` is correct or needs updated.
Some licences have subtle differences from each other, and variations that are
difficult to distinguish, for those who do not have an eidetic memory for
licence texts, and a mental facility to easily perform such comparisons.
The GPL-3.0 licensed SPDX License Diff browser addon/extension for Chrome, Edge,
Firefox, and Opera based browsers allows you to lookup and check package licence
texts easily and quickly:
https://github.com/spdx/spdx-license-diff/releases
It allows you to clear and update the SPDX License List data, set an interval
for checking for List updates, other checking criteria, display and highlight
colours.
After installing and enabling the browser addon/extension, enable display of its
icon in your browser window, access your package licence text in a browser
window, for example, with a file:// URI, or from a web repo, select the licence
text to be checked, and click the addon/extension icon to perform a (local
browser) lookup and comparison.
SPDX License Diff will highlight in different colours matching mandatory and
optional licence text and unmatched extraneous text, and display the highest
probability matching SPDX licence id.
Where GNU or other licences offer -only or -or-later variations, you will have
to read other package docs to distinguish those terms, as those are not part of
the GNU licence texts.
Hope others find this SPDX License Diff browser addon/extension as useful as I
have over the last few years, and don't have any objections to my belated
decision to mention it to maintainers and packagers.
--
Take care. Thanks, Brian Inglis Calgary, Alberta, Canada
La perfection est atteinte Perfection is achieved
non pas lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à ajouter not when there is no more to add
mais lorsqu'il n'y a plus rien à retrancher but when there is no more to cut
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
