Anton Gladky writes ("MCD-ST Liberty SW License Agreement"):
> Particularly, there is a 3rd-party code from hardware-manufacturer,
> which is licensed under their own
> "MCD-ST Liberty SW License Agreement V2" license" [2].
...
> At the first look, it is a free one:
>
> ========
> STMicroelectronics (“ST”) grants You a non-exclusive, worldwide,
> non-transferable
> (whether by assignment or otherwise unless expressly authorized by ST) non
> sub-
> licensable, revocable, royalty-free limited license of the Licensed Software
> to:
>
> (i) make copies, prepare derivative works of the source code version
> of the Licensed Software for the sole and exclusive purpose of
> developing versions of such Licensed Software only for use within the
> Product;
The problem here is `only for use within the Product'. In the licence
agreement restricts a `Product' to be one where the `Licensed
Software' executes only on ST's chips.
That makes this software non-free.
If you strip this code out of the package, is the remaining thing
useable ?
I think that it would be right and proper to throw out the support for
ST Microelectronics's hardware until such time as they offer a Free
licence for the support code.
IMO the licence does leave us able to distribute the ST code in
non-free. But please do not relegate the whole package to non-free
unless it's useless without the ST code.
> ========
> Unless otherwise explicitly stated in this Agreement, You may not
> sell, assign, sublicense, lease, rent or otherwise distribute the
> Licensed Software for commercial purposes, in whole or in part.
> ========
>
> Does it mean, that this license does not permit the commercial use and
> is automatically dfsg-incompatible? There are some other stuff in
> Restriction which is probably also makes the license non-free.
Yes.
> If it is so, is it OK to put the package into a non-free section
> or the license is too bad even for that?
I disagree with the other respondents who say the licence is too bad
for non-free.
Ian.
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