README: Gnulib normally doesn't generate a tarball.

[gnulib.git] / doc / maintain.texi

diff --git a/doc/maintain.texi b/doc/maintain.texi
index 93fcde0..33b851b 100644 (file)
--- a/doc/maintain.texi
+++ b/doc/maintain.texi
@@ -5,7 +5,7 @@
 @c For double-sided printing, uncomment:
 @c @setchapternewpage odd
 @c This date is automagically updated when you save this file:
-@set lastupdate December 6, 2005
+@set lastupdate December 30, 2005
 @c %**end of header
 
 @dircategory GNU organization
@@ -428,14 +428,14 @@ directory for the program itself.
 @section Copyright Notices
 @cindex copyright notices in program files
 
-You should maintain a proper copyright notice and a license notice in
-each nontrivial file in the package.  (Any file more than ten lines
-long is nontrivial for this purpose.)  This includes header files and
-interface definitions for building or running the program,
-documentation files, and any supporting files.  If a file has been
-explicitly placed in the public domain, then instead of a copyright
-notice, it should have a notice saying explicitly that it is in the
-public domain.
+You should maintain a proper copyright notice and a license
+notice in each nontrivial file in the package.  (Any file more than ten
+lines long is nontrivial for this purpose.)  This includes header files
+and interface definitions for
+building or running the program, documentation files, and any supporting
+files.  If a file has been explicitly placed in the public domain, then
+instead of a copyright notice, it should have a notice saying explicitly
+that it is in the public domain.
 
 Even image files and sound files should contain copyright notices and
 license notices, if they can.  Some formats do not have room for textual
@@ -470,10 +470,18 @@ message should use parenthesized @samp{C} by default, though message
 translations may use C-in-a-circle in locales where that symbol is
 known to work.
 
-To update the list of year numbers, add each year in which you change
-the package.  (Here we assume you're using a publicly accessible
-revision control server, so that every revision installed is also
-immediately and automatically published.)
+To update the list of year numbers, add each year in which you have
+made nontrivial changes to the package.  (Here we assume you're using
+a publicly accessible revision control server, so that every revision
+installed is also immediately and automatically published.)  When you
+add the new year, it is not required to keep track which files have
+seen significant changes in the new year and which have not.  It is
+recommended and simpler to add the new year to all files in the
+package, and be done with it for the rest of the year.
+
+For files which are regularly copied from another project (such as
+@samp{gnulib}), the copyright notice should left as it is in the
+original.
 
 Don't delete old year numbers, though; they can indicate when older
 versions might theoretically go into the public domain.  If you copy a
@@ -483,6 +491,11 @@ years that come with the file.
 Do not abbreviate the year list using a range; for instance, do not
 write @samp{1996--1998}; instead, write @samp{1996, 1997, 1998}.
 
+The copyright statement may be split across multiple lines, both in
+source files and in any generated output.  This often happens for
+files with a long history, having many different years of
+publication.
+
 For an FSF-copyrighted package, if you have followed the procedures to
 obtain legal papers, each file should have just one copyright holder:
 the Free Software Foundation, Inc.  You should edit the file's
@@ -507,6 +520,7 @@ whole program.  It might be in the @file{README} file, or it might be
 displayed when the program starts up.  This copyright notice should
 mention the year of completion of the most recent major version; it
 can mention years of completion of previous major versions, but that
+is optional.
 
 
 @node License Notices