Hello,
While implementing REUSE to a repository, I've come across few files with Copyright holder and Author.
Should I add change Author to Copyright holder or it should be unchanged?
Thanks for your help.
Regards, Rohit
Hello Rohit,
Thanks for using REUSE.
Can you provide some examples to make it more concrete? You can anonimise it of course.
Legally the author (or contributor) and copyright are different. The author has done the contribution, but especially in a work context whether consultancy or employment the company is typically the copyright holder. For individual contributors making the contribution on their own behalf, the copyright is typically with that person. More on this in the FAQ https://reuse.software/faq/#copyright-holder-author
The safest option is to keep things as close to what they where, so the conversion to REUSE/SPDX on introduces the most minimal change. As suggested in the FAQ https://reuse.software/faq/#edit-copyright-and-licensing%C2%A0 This can for instance manifest itself in having different copyright header styles because each author might have a different way or preference to state their copyright https://reuse.software/faq/#copyright-symbol
Feel free to follow up if you are left with some further questions
Best, Nico Rikken