On 04/16/13 15:47, Chris Adams wrote: > Once upon a time, Kevin Martin <ktmdms@xxxxxxxxx> said: >> What is the reason that rar archive extraction support is not included in the 7z.so in the p7zip-plugins rpm? > > In the p7zip SRPM SPEC file: > > # RAR sources removed since their license is incompatible with the LGPL > > In a package review attempt for "unrar": > > https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=319831#c25 > ************************************************************************ > I spoke via email to Eugene Roshal about this issue. He was unaware that clamav > had used derived code from their implementation in clamav, under the GPL > license, and stated that he did not grant them permission to do so. > > He said that the only way he was willing for such code to be used was with a > clause like the following: > > "The unRAR sources cannot be used to re-create the RAR compression algorithm, > which is proprietary. Distribution of modified unRAR sources in separate form > or as a part of other software is permitted, provided that it is clearly > stated in the documentation and source comments that the code may > not be used to develop a RAR (WinRAR) compatible archiver." > > Unfortunately, such a restriction conflicts directly with the GPL, and is a > showstopper. > > This code cannot go into Fedora as is. All RAR v3.x support would need to be > stripped out, before it could be considered. Given that most RAR files are RAR > v3, that severely limits the usefulness of this application. > ************************************************************************ > > Basically, the only documentation of the file format is in the unrar > source code, and it is under a non-free license. I don't think anyone > has tried to reverse engineer it to make a clean-room implementation. > Thanks for the info. It seems strange that because the folks at RAR don't want 7zip to be able to *create* RAR archives that Redhat/Fedora has to remove even the ability to extract RAR archives with 7z. Not being a programmer I guess I don't get how hard it would be to hobble allowing creation while still allowing extraction. Kevin -- test mailing list test@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx To unsubscribe: https://admin.fedoraproject.org/mailman/listinfo/test
