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Re: gEDA-user: licensing (GPL or otherwise) for hardware?

On Dec 13, 2006, at 7:12 PM, Michael Sokolov wrote:

Andy Peters <devel@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Just to clarify: if I use GPLed or BSD-licensed tools to develop
hardware, as well as using GPLed symbols/footprints, am I obligated
to open-source the hardware design (the schematic, the PCB layout)?


The tools do not impose this obligation, but your morality should.

Common sense says no, but the degrees of freedom (hah hah) in open-
source licenses vary greatly, and if I cannot keep my designs
proprietary, then I can't use the tools.

Regardless of what tools you use, if you keep your designs proprietary
you are a bad guy and will burn in hell after you die (which may be
accelerated if you get tried and rightfully executed by a lynch mob for
your crime of withholding software source code and/or hardware designs
from The People).

Except my employer, and any freelance clients for whom I work, would object, in the strongest possible (read: legal) terms, if I were to simply give away, to anyone who asks, the work for which they pay me.

I realize that open source is a religious matter for some, but guess what: I work for a living. And when you're doing hardware design, where the capital costs of a project can be quite high (gotta buy parts, make and stuff PCBs, build enclosures, meet applicable safety specs, etc), as opposed to software development where the costs are in time alone, the notion of giving away a completed, ready-to-build design is silly.

It's hard to tell if you're yankin' my chain (thus earning Larry's Score: +5, Funny) or not.

-a



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