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Set up REUSE (5 min)

REUSE comes with a python-based tool that will allow you to set up licensing and verify compliance with the REUSE standard. The verification will run in CI/CD, which already set up for the template repo.
All that remains to do is to set up the tool locally to specify license information quickly.

Install pipx​

For simplicity it is recommended to run the tool with pipx, which, without any setup, runs python applications in isolated environments. Head over to https://pypa.github.io/pipx/installation/ for instructions.

Test the REUSE command​

  1. Run pipx run reuse lint
  2. You should see output from REUSE. It may complain about non-compliance, that is ok at this point.

Initialize REUSE​

If your repository was created based on https://github.com/telekom/reuse-template it will already feature a file named REUSE.toml in the root directory.

If the file is not yet present, copy https://github.com/telekom/reuse-template/blob/main/REUSE.toml to your repository. At the beginning it is fine that the file is mostly empty, the nexts steps will tell you if you need to add additional information.

tip

This is no longer necessary (and the init subcommand no longer exists) as of the reuse specification 3.2.

You can skip ahead to the next step!

tip

As of spec version 3.2 .reuse/dep5 has been replaced by ./REUSE.toml. You can update your old dep5 file to a .toml using pipx run reuse convert-dep5

  1. Clone your repository locally
  2. In the cloned directory, run pipx run reuse init
  3. The command will ask basic information about the project
    1. You can skip the license question with ENTER, as the licenses will be handled later.
      info

      If you know which licenses will be used you can of course already enter them. The input expects the SPDX Identifier.

    2. The internet address of your project will be the GitHub repository URL, unless you have a separate website.
    3. The name of the maintainer can be "Deutsche Telekom AG".
    4. The e-mail of the maintainer can be "opensource@telekom.de".
      warning

      If you are not a Deutsche Telekom employee you should obviously use your own name and e-mail!

If the file is not yet present, copy https://github.com/telekom/reuse-template/blob/main/REUSE.toml to your repository. At the beginning it is fine that the file is mostly empty, the nexts steps will tell you if you need to add additional information.