Eric Blake writes: > Speaking of tools, should we include SPDX tags alongside the full text > of all our licenses, as that is yet another thing that aids > license-checking tools? > > https://spdx.github.io/spdx-spec/appendix-V-using-SPDX-short-identifiers-in-source-files/ I'm not a big fan of doing that -- to me it is yet another way we patch source code to solve external tooling problems, and this tool is not even used for technical purposes. I believe we've seen that over time that is a bad approach, even if a good case can be made for each improvement (like this). Another problem is that SPDX introduce the possibility of mismatch between the license mentioned by a SPDX tag and the license boiler plate (which is GNU policy and standard legal behaviour). Given that we already have some of that complexity in gnulib ('License:' clause in modules file), I'm not sure I would want to make the situation even more complex. OTOH, I don't think there needs to be a firm catch-all rule on this, if someone wants to include and maintain SPDX tags in some files. /Simon