On Sun, Nov 15, 2020 at 4:57 AM Mikhail Vladimirov <[email protected]> wrote: > > I'm going to release a fork of a standard library package that was trimmed > down and optimized for some niche use case. As far as I understand at the > very least I should keep the original LICENSE file. What about the > CONTRIBUTORS list? Should I also keep per-file copyright headers? What if a > file is mostly new code with just a function or two based on Go sources?
There are legal questions and I am not a lawyer. If this really matters you should check with a lawyer. That said, yes, if you base your code on code in the Go distribution you should include a copy of the contents of the LICENSE file. The CONTRIBUTORS file has no legal meaning and is irrelevant. The AUTHORS file is technically the list of the copyright holders. The contents of the AUTHORS file is the same as what the LICENSE file calls "The Go Authors". But you don't have to keep your own copy of the AUTHORS file. It's not hard for anybody to find out what the "The Go Authors" refers to. You should keep the per-file copyright headers for any file that contains any code that is directly based on code in the Go repository. You do not need to keep the per-file copyright header for any file that contains entirely new code. But even though you don't need to keep the Go copyright header, I would advise that you keep some copyright header. At least, I would advise that if you would like anybody to use your code for their business. Businesses want to see clear and simple legal guidelines. Don't make it ambiguous or confusing by omitting licenses or copyrights. As far as I know, what I write here is reasonable and appropriate, but, again, I am not a lawyer. And, to be extra clear on a legal matter, I don't speak for Google in any way. Ian -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "golang-nuts" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/golang-nuts/CAOyqgcUDcyvzmLtK-DciEoAHO6s375Og-9yVFucUin2EGEJqFQ%40mail.gmail.com.
