Re: [PATCH] serial: sirf: update copyright years to 2014

From: Greg KH <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>
To: Barry Song <21cnbao@gmail.com>
Cc: "linux-serial@vger.kernel.org" <linux-serial@vger.kernel.org>,
	DL-SHA-WorkGroupLinux <workgroup.linux@csr.com>,
	Barry Song <Baohua.Song@csr.com>
Subject: Re: [PATCH] serial: sirf: update copyright years to 2014
Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2014 06:37:44 -0800	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <20140212143744.GA10095@kroah.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <CAGsJ_4zuju7x06nvZOMKvU8xfULy5bgNTyENSfmPVNg6TcwRdQ@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 10:26:32PM +0800, Barry Song wrote:
> 2014-02-12 22:19 GMT+08:00 Greg KH <gregkh@linuxfoundation.org>:
> > On Wed, Feb 12, 2014 at 10:08:44PM +0800, Barry Song wrote:
> >> From: Barry Song <Baohua.Song@csr.com>
> >>
> >> Signed-off-by: Barry Song <Baohua.Song@csr.com>
> >> ---
> >>  drivers/tty/serial/sirfsoc_uart.c |    3 ++-
> >>  1 file changed, 2 insertions(+), 1 deletion(-)
> >>
> >> diff --git a/drivers/tty/serial/sirfsoc_uart.c b/drivers/tty/serial/sirfsoc_uart.c
> >> index 49a2ffd..7079b5c 100644
> >> --- a/drivers/tty/serial/sirfsoc_uart.c
> >> +++ b/drivers/tty/serial/sirfsoc_uart.c
> >> @@ -1,7 +1,8 @@
> >>  /*
> >>   * Driver for CSR SiRFprimaII onboard UARTs.
> >>   *
> >> - * Copyright (c) 2011 Cambridge Silicon Radio Limited, a CSR plc group company.
> >> + * Copyright (c) 2011 - 2014 Cambridge Silicon Radio Limited, a CSR plc group
> >> + * company.
> >
> > I do not see contributions from csr for all of these years, so no, this
> > is not allowed.  Please go talk with your corporate lawyer if you have
> > questions about how/when to update the copyright of your files, as I
> > don't think they would agree that this change is correct.
> 
> Greg, as i run "git log sirfsoc_uart.c", there are commits from csr
> for touched file from 2011 to 2014:
> 
> 2011:
> commit 161e773cbd0c3d1b5b8cc00602e1f72de61ed4f7
> Author: Rong Wang <Rong.Wang@csr.com>
> Date:   Thu Nov 17 23:17:04 2011 +0800
> 
> 2012:
> commit 5425e03f97d1e5847372aae0b895d8d1c9bf2741
> Author: Barry Song <Baohua.Song@csr.com>
> Date:   Tue Dec 25 17:32:04 2012 +0800
> 
> 2013:
> commit ac4ce718893c546f7a2d34ab55a8f75842399f86
> Author: Barry Song <Baohua.Song@csr.com>
> Date:   Wed Jan 16 14:49:27 2013 +0800
> ...
> commit 59f8a62c25b9c2a53e7c359ba9ca611639a4c0b0
> Author: Qipan Li <Qipan.Li@csr.com>
> Date:   Sat Sep 21 09:02:10 2013 +0800
> 
> 
> 2014:
> commit 388faf9ffdaf92c81243514a2dd4c6ce04d28874
> Author: Qipan Li <Qipan.Li@csr.com>
> Date:   Fri Jan 3 15:44:07 2014 +0800
> 
> commit df8d4aa0d84995bf7fb8d8a978a0d67fff6ca53a
> Author: Qipan Li <Qipan.Li@csr.com>
> Date:   Fri Jan 3 15:44:08 2014 +0800

And do all of these changes fall under the "copyright is allowed to be
updated" rule that your corporation follows?  Again, please talk to your
corporate lawyer about this, as the rules I have been told to follow do
not seem to match up here.  I'll be glad to discuss this with your
lawyer through email if they have further questions.

thanks,

greg k-h