Allow spdx and other license schemes?

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Overview

For example, spdx is often used in other metadata systems.

Example from Datacite notation:

  "rightsList": [
    {
      "rights": "Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International",
      "rightsIdentifier": "cc-by-4.0",
      "rightsIdentifierScheme": "spdx",
      "rightsUri": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode"
    }
  ]

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For example, the REUSE standard uses SPDX:

• https://reuse.software/tutorial/
• https://spdx.org/licenses/

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@peterdesmet @pschumm @sapetti9 WDYT?

It doesn't look that Open Definition is actively maintained so it might be a huge limitation for Data Package authors, isn't it?

[peterdesmet]

I don't know what the state is of the Open Definition, but if it is indeed not maintained than we should opt for an alternative.

SPDX - which I am not familiar with - is indeed a good candidate:

1. Maintained: https://github.com/spdx/license-list-data

2. Also used by Zenodo:

Choose one of the widely recommended used licenses presented, or search/browse for a standard licenses. Zenodo relies on the widely used SPDX list of license. If you cannot find your license you can add a custom license (see next section).

3. At first glance, the identifiers in Open Definition are similar to those used in SPDX, but should investigate further. If fully compatible, then this is an easier change to make.

[peterdesmet]

After comparing Opendefinition with SPDX:

• SPDX lists a lot more licenses 👍

• The identifiers are exactly the same 👍 except for:

  • GFDL-1.3-no-cover-texts-no-invariant-sections = GFDL-1.3-no-invariants-or-later or similar in SPDX
  • ODC-BY-1.0 = ODC-By-1.0 in SPDX (different capitalization)
  • WXwindows = wxWindows in SPDX (different capitalization)

• There are some discrepancies between names (Open Government Licence v1.0 vs Open Government Licence 1.0 (United Kingdom), but all within reason

• 21 licenses in the open definition are not listed in SPDX, but they are all obscure imo:

Against-DRM: Against DRM
DSL: Design Science License
FAL-1.3: Free Art License 1.3
LO-FR-2.0: Open License 2.0
Talis: Talis Community License
dli-model-use: Statistics Canada: Data Liberation Initiative (DLI) - Model Data Use Licence
geogratis: Geogratis
hesa-withrights: Higher Education Statistics Agency Copyright with data.gov.uk rights
localauth-withrights: Local Authority Copyright with data.gov.uk rights
met-office-cp: Met Office UK Climate Projections Licence Agreement
mitre: MITRE Collaborative Virtual Workspace License (CVW License)
notspecified: License Not Specified
other-at: Other (Attribution)
other-closed: Other (Not Open)
other-nc: Other (Non-Commercial)
other-open: Other (Open)
other-pd: Other (Public Domain)
ukclickusepsi: UK Click Use PSI
ukcrown: UK Crown Copyright
ukcrown-withrights: UK Crown Copyright with data.gov.uk rights
ukpsi: UK PSI Public Sector Information

All in all, I think we can recommend SPDX for the license name.

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@peterdesmet Amazing!