RE: RFE: Add Subversion keyword for year

> On Tue, Apr 19, 2011 at 12:02 AM, Daniel Becroft
> <djcbecroft_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> > On Tue, Apr 19, 2011 at 7:29 AM, Alex Vincent
> <ajvincent_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> >>
> >> I'm currently in the process of updating copyright notices where
> I work.
> >> To me, this is an ideal place for a SVN keyword:
> >>
> >> Copyright 2008-$Year$ MyCompany
> >>
> >> The SVN keywords listed in the online documentation list Date,
> but it's
> >> far too specific for a copyright.  As an alternate, perhaps a
> special
> >> formatting keyword for dates could be established:
> $Date(YYYY)$, for
> >> example.
> >
> > AFAIK, the $Date keyword works off the last time the particular
> file was
> > updated. Are you expecting this new $Year$ value to always be
> current (ie
> > 2011), or only reflect the year in which the file was last
> modified (ie
> > 2009)?
>
> IANAL and slightly OT, but... are you legally allowed to update the
> copyright date without making a copyrightable modification of the
> file?
> If not; no tool can help you.

A copyright notice is not necessary but recommended. The copyright notice applies to the "work" so, the whole program is the work. Putting a notice on every file is not required. However, the copyright notice applies to the work, so even if a specific file hasn't been changed the notice should be the same on every file, in your documentation, on your distribution media and probably displayed on a startup/splash screen/about page.

Also, if you don't publish the source, the notice in the source is probably not needed.

The date listed is the publication date. Also, any time you publish a substatial change it is a new "work" so the date should be updated. Usually all the publish dates are listed...

Copyright 2010 Big Software, Inc.

if you modify it and put out a release in 2011 you change it to:

Copyright 2010-2011 Big Software, Inc.

no changes until 2014 you would do:

Copyright 2010-2011, 2014 Big Software, Inc.

So, I wouldn't want this automatically done. I would recommend you use a copyright.txt file with the notice and have your build system or something inject it.

BTW: IANAL either.

BOb
Received on 2011-04-19 15:42:54 CEST