Are comment headers and footers in your code really necessary? [closed]

Question

Many corporate coding standards require a large comment header and footer in each and every file. Something like:

// MyFile.cpp // //  Copyright (c) 200x Company ABC //  //  This file is a copyrighted... blah blah blah //  <... some code ...>  // Copyright (c) 200x Company ABC // //  Change history: //     1.0  -  Blah //     1.1  -  Blah, blah.. 

So, the question is - why do we need this? Is this really necessary to claim copyright for the contents of the file, or is it a misguided practice that has become standard? Anybody out there work for a company that does NOT require something like this?

Answer 1

First, the change history is pointless, use your SCM for that.

A copyright statement is not strictly required (copyright is automatic)¹, but if you are publishing source then likely including it will be felt to be safer². The full licence statement would probably be better in a separate file and then referenced (this is what Boost does).

¹Wikipedia has a reasonable summary, but you really need to take your own legal advice.

² Especially by lawyers playing it safe.

Answer 2

My company doesn't require this... and the place of the change history should be in the source code control instead of the code file.