[okl4-developer] License query

[Rob McCammon]

Hi David,
Thanks for the thorough email explanation of your question. I appreciate the
concern that would exist if the license were such that one party (A) could
be in violation of the license as a result of the independent action of
another party (B). Fortunately that is not the case.

As you probably already know OKL4 is dual-licensed. The OKL4 open source
license is perfect for almost all personal, academic, and open source
development users. Commercial users of OKL4 who will distribute OKL4 along
with other software which is not open source are served by the commercial
license.

The key to understanding the answer to your question may center on the use
of the phrase "accompanying software" in 1.c.ii. The terms of the open
source license apply to software that is redistributed with OKL4. Let me use
an example to explain.

Party A creates an open source software component for use with OKL4 and
makes it available to others to use in a design

Party B creates a commercial/proprietary software component for use with
OKL4 and makes it available to others to use in a design

Party A can use and redistribute OKL4 under the open source license.

Party B can use OKL4 under the open source license as long as they do not
need to redistribute OKL4. If they need to redistribute OKL4 then they need
to use OKL4 under the available commercial license.

Party C wants to build a device that includes the component from Party A and
the component from Party B as well as OKL4. If Party C cannot get agreement
from Party B to satisfy the terms of the open source license in the context
of Party C's usage then Party C needs to use and redistribute OKL4 under the
terms of the commercial license.

The open source license does not create any situations where one party's
ability to satisfy the terms of the license in their use of OKL4 is
controlled by another downstream party after the fact.

I hope that answers your question. Please let me know if you still have
questions or concerns

Rob McCammon
Open Kernel Labs


-----Original Message-----
From: developer-bounces at okl4.org [mailto:developer-bounces at okl4.org] On
Behalf Of David Given
Sent: Monday, September 22, 2008 05:48
To: developer at okl4.org
Subject: [okl4-developer] License query

I have a query about the open source license.

Section 1 (c) says:

(c) Redistributions in any form must be accompanied by information on
 * how to obtain complete source code for:
 * (i) the Software; and
 * (ii) all accompanying software that uses (or is intended to
 * use) the Software whether directly or indirectly.  Such source
 * code must:
[...]
 * (iv) be licensed by each relevant holder of copyright under
 * either the Licence Terms (with an appropriate copyright notice)
 * or the terms of a licence which is approved by the Open Source
 * Initative.  For an executable file, "complete source code"
 * means the source code for all modules it contains and includes
 * associated build and other files reasonably required to produce
 * the executable.

I'm curious about that 'or indirectly'. Because it seems to me that that
would apply to the following situation:

- party A has a distribution of OK Linux.
- party B has a proprietary binary for Linux. Being binary compatible
with ordinary Linux, it will run on top of OK Linux.

Party A would then be unable to distribute their software, because they
are unable to provide sources for party B's software. They need to do
this because party B's software is intended to run on top of Linux,
which means that it can indirectly use OKL4, which means the above
license clause kicks in. Note that party A need have no knowledge of
party B's software; it's mere existence causes them to infringe.

This is clearly unreasonable, and I'm being pedantic, but it does appear
to be a valid interpretation of the license --- can I have
clarification, please?

-- 
David Given
dg at cowlark.com

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