Diagnose an Unneeded LICENSE File Pointer

Flags + file LICENSE added to a standard license R knows, such as GPL-3 + file LICENSE, LGPL-3 + file LICENSE or Apache License 2.0 + file LICENSE. MIT and the BSD licenses are templates that need a LICENSE file naming the year and copyright holder, so they are left alone, as is a bare file LICENSE. Each alternative of a dual license such as GPL-3 + file LICENSE | MIT + file LICENSE is judged on its own.

Usage

lab_license_file_unneeded(path = ".", verbose = TRUE, desc = NULL)

Arguments

path

Character. Path to the package directory. Default: ".".

verbose

Logical. Print diagnostic output. Default: TRUE.

desc

Optional pre-parsed DESCRIPTION, as returned by base::read.dcf(). Defaults to reading it from path.

Value

checktor_check_result() with passed, issues, message.

Details

A LICENSE that adds attribution requirements or other restrictions is the exception CRAN allows. Explain it in cran-comments.md and allow the finding with Config/checktor/allow: license_file_unneeded.

Source

The CRAN Cookbook's LICENSE files recipe gives the reviewers' text: "We do not need \"+ file LICENSE\" and the file as these are part of R. This is only needed in case of attribution requirements or other possible restrictions. Hence please omit it." R agrees in two places. R CMD check NOTEs "License components with restrictions not permitted" for a license that takes no extension, such as GPL (>= 2) or Apache, and the incoming check NOTEs "License components with restrictions and base license permitting such" for one that does, such as GPL-3. See vignette("check-sources", package = "checktor") for how every check maps to its source.

See also

lab_license() for a license R cannot read; checktor(), which runs this and every other check.

Examples

pkg <- example_diagnose_scenario("description_examples/license_file_unneeded_bad.txt",
                                 show_content = FALSE)
lab_license_file_unneeded(pkg, verbose = FALSE)$issues
#> [1] "GPL-3 + file LICENSE: GPL-3 is a standard license R knows, so CRAN needs neither '+ file LICENSE' nor the file"
unlink(pkg, recursive = TRUE)