[Mesa3d-dev] SGI Free Software license B v1.1: Is it Free?

[James A. T. <tr...@de...>]

While the license has some interesting points, that will inspire strong
opinions from many directions, I believe that the issue of compatibility
with the DFSG comes down to section 2.3.

Here's my quick take on what SGI is trying to accomplish. They want
to allow free use of the software, but in software form only; don't
try translating one of the algorithms for use in hardware. They
also want free use of any patents that a user holds on algorithms used
in the software. Pretty slick -- A company notices that the code uses
an algorithm they have patented, but only after executing the code.
They can't sue because by using the software they have given SGI
free use of their patent. Would it hold up in court? I have no idea.
They also allow the software to be redistributed under a different
license. The issues are sufficiently muddled that it probably isn't
worth attempting.

In addition to deciding whether the license is compatable with the
DFSG, it is also important that it be compatable with the current
license used by mesa. Luckily, this second issue doesn't appear to
be a problem.

Since Debian has a number of people who have experience with licenses
and are sufficiently demented^H^H^H^H^H^Hinterested to spend some time
on this issue, I'll forward this to debian-legal and see what they
have to say on the issue.

-- 
James (Jay) Treacy
tr...@de...