Re: [f-cpu] last news about licence

[Yann Guidon <whygee@f-cpu.org>]

hi !

nicO wrote:
> Hello everybody,
> 
> I just have a big conversation about the licende issue with Mélanie
> Clément Fontaine. She's a lawyer who make a thesis about the
> applicability of the GPL to the french law.

how did you finally succeed ? i would love to be part of the discussion :-)

> It was hard (;p) to explain all the issue of the hardware compare to the
> software. But the result are there. So the source code is protected as
> in the software world.

As authors, it is a minimum : our copyright and author rights can be enforced
and the project is protected.

> There is also a protection on the mask file
> (GDS2) because you could only produice it with the previous code. So
> using GS2 file to by pass the licence, isn't really possible.

this is where the story is getting more complex, right...

> So if we use the GPL it's impossible to mix it with proprietary
> code (so we can't distribut it as an ip).
i thought that GPL was good only for software ? so the linking mechanisms
and some definitions of the GPL don't apply.

> If we use the LGPL, it's possible (as for library) to use with other
> type of code.
i am not particularly fond of this solution, as others know.
LGPL is often understood as "weak" GPL and it can be perceived as
a wrong signal.

let's remember that F-CPU was not started as an "IP core project"
in the beginning btw.

> Or we can create all knew licence, with the definition of interface
> (API). But we will have problem to write it without a lawyer.
i prefer this way. This will be the occasion to define everything
in the right context and probably start from a new, non-GNU, ground.

> As you should know i prefer to use a licence to distribut the fcpu as an IP.
can you be more precise about "a licence" ?

> So i suggest to translate our current licence to LPGL. It's possible
> because only Michael, Whygee and Cedric had written code. They own the
> copyright on there code.  So there knew code version could use LGPL
> licence.

I do not think that it will magically solve our problem.

> Comments ?

it is still a hot topic :-)
thanks for restarting this discussion,

> nicO
WHYGEE (trying to cleanup his f-cpu source file tree)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PS: i CC: to the hardlicense-discuss mailing list, as it might be
of interest to others.
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