I am also very much in favor of using a license which requires openness but like Adam said, in the embedded world it is quite common that changes will be necessary in order to support some hardware configuration. Additionally, the interpretation that we would need dynamic linking in order to comply with the license without opening up all application code makes this a quite important question.
Companies are not always willing or even able (because of patents, NDAs or other contracts) to release the source of proprietary applications. The use of LGPL in RIOT has been the source of some discussion between me and my colleagues and I hope to see some other license in the future where it is possible to still distribute proprietary applications that run on RIOT. Eistec (see www.eistec.se) generally has the policy that anything related to the platform and OS (cpu drivers, device drivers, etc) will be sent upstream to related OSS projects, mainly RIOT and Contiki for now (but we have also provided some patches for other tools we use, such as OpenOCD), but we usually want to keep application code (algorithms, higher level service implementations etc.) proprietary. Since we work as a consulting firm it is also common that we do not own the code to the applications themselves but have to negotiate with the client on what parts to release, clients are usually fine with sharing bug fixes and low level driver and OS code with upstream. So far we have only used Contiki commercially but I personally would like to see that change in the future, but for now I think the risk of ending up in a situation where someone can demand any proprietary application code from us makes this a bit too dangerous. This is my personal view on the license situation, but I know that many of the people I work with share this concern. Best regards Joakim Gebart Managing Director Eistec AB Aurorum 1C 977 75 Luleå Tel: +46(0)730-65 13 83 joakim.geb...@eistec.se www.eistec.se On Thu, Dec 4, 2014 at 5:06 AM, Adam Hunt <voxa...@gmail.com> wrote: > While I've been a fervent supporter of the GPL for many years I'm on board > with a change to a simple BSD or MIT style license. Initially I was > skeptical about the need to move away from the LGPL but in the world of > embedded systems it's very common to make changes to the core codebase in > order to work on various platforms. Under the LGPL such changes would have > to be tracked, checked for IP conflicts, and made available. This > requirement may very well end up being so onerous that it may vary well push > companies to adopt a more suitably licensed alternative over RIOT. > > On Wed, Dec 3, 2014, 2:14 PM Thomas Watteyne <watte...@eecs.berkeley.edu> > wrote: >> >> Emmanuel, >> I support the change to BSD. One of the reasons is that OpenWSN is also on >> BSD, so integration of the different code bases might be easier when both >> have the same license. >> Thomas >> >> On Wednesday, December 3, 2014, Emmanuel Baccelli >> <emmanuel.bacce...@inria.fr> wrote: >>> >>> Dear RIOTers, >>> >>> we have been receiving an increasing amount of negative feedback from >>> various companies concerning the practical usability of our LGPL license in >>> their context, being a show-stopper. >>> >>> For this reason, INRIA, Freie Universitaet (FU) Berlin and Hamburg >>> University of Applied Science (HAW) are currently considering changing the >>> license of their contributions to RIOT to a less restrictive license (i.e. >>> BSD, potentially as soon as next release). >>> >>> Such a switch to BSD is betting that the effect of a potentially smaller >>> percentage of user/devel contributing back to the master branch will be >>> dwarfed by the effect of a user/devel community growing much bigger and >>> quicker. This seems doable considering the current momentum around RIOT. >>> >>> In a second phase, if such a license switch takes place for INRIA/FU/HAW >>> contributions, we would then contact other contributors individually, to >>> check their status concerning a similar switch for their own contributions. >>> >>> But in the first place, we would like to debate this topic. In >>> particular: is anyone violently opposing the idea of migrating to a less >>> restrictive license, such as BSD? If so, why? On the other hand, if you >>> explicitly support the license change, feel free to indicate this as well. >>> Please send your opinion to the list before Dec. 10th. >>> >>> Cheers, >>> >>> Emmanuel >> >> _______________________________________________ >> devel mailing list >> devel@riot-os.org >> http://lists.riot-os.org/mailman/listinfo/devel > > > _______________________________________________ > devel mailing list > devel@riot-os.org > http://lists.riot-os.org/mailman/listinfo/devel > _______________________________________________ devel mailing list devel@riot-os.org http://lists.riot-os.org/mailman/listinfo/devel
