On Mon, Aug 02, 1999 at 18:20:45 +0200, Peter Makholm wrote: > +/* NIST Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) effort. The algorithm */ > +/* is subject to Patent action by IBM, who intend to offer royalty */ > +/* free use if a Patent is granted. */ > > This is OK to put into non-us/main. Not because free use is granted > but because we don't care about us-patent rules in non-us.
How sure are we IBM is only pursuing a patent in the US? [IDEA] > If the above only covers patents and not the copyright I could put it > into non-us/main? IDEA is patented in most of Europe, where non-US is located. > If the copyright for the code mentions the above it should go into > non-us/non-free? Probably, or use a free IDEA implementation (e.g. from the Pike crypto toolkit, or from mcrypt). > Does the european patent mean anything to the package? I've not seen a concensus opinion about patent issues in Europe affecting non-US. Personally, I think that patent-encumbered algorithms should not be considered free, except where the patent is licensed in a liberal way (allowing free use in free software). > (The CAST-256 thingy goes into non-free until I know what the CAST-256 > conditions is. That is no problem.) CAST-128 was specifically not patented to allow it to become an IETF standard. I hope that if it's patented, its licensing condititions will be favourable. Ray -- J.H.M. Dassen | RUMOUR Believe all you hear. Your world may [EMAIL PROTECTED] | not be a better one than the one the blocks | live in but it'll be a sight more vivid. | - The Hipcrime Vocab by Chad C. Mulligan