Re: Notabug.org should be moved to B tier

[bill-auger]

On Sun, 29 Oct 2023 22:08:00 -0400 Richard wrote:
> Also, if we give it grade B, what would be the flaws that prevent it
> from advancing to grade A?  We would want to mention those in
> https://www.gnu.org/software/repo-criteria-evaluation.html.

that is where the checklists are handy https://libreplanet.org/wiki/Notabug

actually, notabug may satisfy the entire 'A' class - the checklist has A2, A3,
and A9 unchecked; but we later determined that it passes A3 and A9 - i forgot
to tick those boxes afterward - this is an excerpt from my last review:

On Tue, 23 Mar 2021 06:25:30 -0400 bill-auger wrote:
> in summary, i see only two criteria which are clearly failing:
> B0 and A+5
>
> if B0 were fixed, it is likely that notabug would rank
> at the A level


at the A level, there was only some dangling doubt about A2

* A2 - Recommends GPL 3-or-later over others

interpreted broadly, it passes A2 - the only documentation about licensing
links to the GNU website for the definition, then lists some popular licenses,
with the GPLs at the top of the list

interpreted strictly, it is unlikely that any forge other than savannah would
ever pass A2 - that is simply because forges do not literally "recommend" any
licenses - they merely offer licenses as an option for new empty repos - they
may or may not recommend that you select any license, though a few forges
require that the license be in the sets approved by the FSF or OSI; but most
forges do not mention licenses beyond that

the notabug documentation about licensing, though very brief, is actually a
relatively strong recommendation of the GPL compared to any other forge than
savannah

this is the exact wording:

> NotABug.org is a free-software code collaboration platform for freely 
> licensed projects.
> We exist to help projects that distribute under any free license.
> These include, but are not limited to:
> 
>     The GNU Affero General Public License
>     The GNU General Public License
>     The Lesser GNU General Public License
>     The Apache License
>     The two clause BSD License
>     The three clause BSD License
>     The MIT License
> 
> And other licenses that meet the Free Software Definition.

... where "free-software" and "Free Software Definition" are links to
https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

if that is not sufficient to pass A2, it could get there rather easily - as we
discussed back then, a single sentence would suffice:

On Sun, 04 Apr 2021 00:53:39 -0400 Richard wrote:
>   > im asking what the notabug admin needs to do, in order to pass A2
>   > - is it sufficient, if the forge has a single sentence, nearby
>   > the license selector:  
> 
>   >   "We recommend that you use the GPLv3-or-later for your project"  
> 
> I think so.