Configuring copyright options

You can configure options to improve copyright lists, which are used in SBOM and Notices File reports.

To configure copyright options:

Log in to Black Duck as a System Administrator.
Click and select System Settings.
Select Copyrights from the lefthand menu.
Check the checkbox for any of the following options:
- Normalize Copyright Entries from the KnowledgeBase. Standardize the format of copyright entries, applying the transformations described below. This option must be enabled to apply any of these transformations.
  
  Warning: By enabling any of these options, you are modifying the fundamental characteristics of copyrights obtained from the KnowledgeBase copyright inventory, and these may now deviate from how they appeared in the identifying source code.
  - Merge Copyrights. Enabling this option will merge identical copyrights with different date ranges. If a component has multiple copyright entries for different years, they will be combined into one entry displaying the range of years.
    
    For example, the following copyrights would be combined into one merged copyright:
```
Copyright 2021 Component Corporation
Copyright 2022 Component Corporation
Copyright 2023 Component Corporation
Copyright 2024 Component Corporation
```
    The resulting merger displays Copyright 2021-2024 Component Corporation.
  - Remove Copyrights Without Dates. Enabling this option will remove any copyrights that do not have a date.
    
    For example the following copyright would be removed from validated copyright lists:
```
Copyright Component Corporation
```
  - Standard Copyright Tag. Selecting one of options below will modify all copyrights to use the desired tag.
    - None, use existing string
    - Copyright ©
    - Copyright (C)
    - Copyright (c)
    - ©
    - (C)
    - (c)
- Truncate Long Copyright Entries. Truncates long copyrights to the first 200 characters. This transformation does not require Normalize Copyright Entries from the KnowledgeBase to be enabled to function. However, if that setting is enabled, Truncate Long Copyright Entries will automatically be enabled and cannot be disabled.

Transformations when normalizing copyright entries

When enabling Normalize Copyright Entries from the KnowledgeBase, the following changes will be applied to copyright entries from the KnowledgeBase. Text normalization is case insensitive.

Escaped character markers like \n and \u003c are replaced with real characters.
Comment markers /*, *, */, //, and # are removed.
All sequences of white space, like \n, \r, \t and spaces are replaced with a single space.
Copyright entries are truncated to 200 characters.
Copyright entries which do not include the word copyright, start with (C) or have (c) or © without a valid date (19dd or 20dd) are rejected.
Copyright entries with no text (numbers are not text) after the copyright marker are rejected.
Copyright entries shorter than 15 characters with no valid date are rejected.
When copyrights are normalized duplicate entries are removed in reports.

Note: Rejected entries are truncated to 200 characters, but otherwise remain unedited.