Re: I am the RD of ASUS, want to confirm the Debian license
刘欢 writes: > Sorry to use a private email,The company's mailbox can not send mail > to @ list.debian.org Sorry to learn of that misconfiguration in your IT system. I hope your company's IT department can correct that fault. > We are developing a laptop test software, hoping to use Debian as the > operating environment, and pre-installed in the user's computer. > According to Debian lisence You probably know, but to be clear: There is no one “Debian license”. The many packages comprising the Debian system have myriad copyright holders, and those holders each grant license only in the specific work in that package. > we do not have to pay for it, just open the Debian source code we use. It is true that all of the different licenses, granted in the many different packages, have an explicit freedom in common: The freedom to redistribute the work you received, with or without modification, under the same license conditions as you received it. There are other conditions and grants in various packages, but that common grant of freedom is the one I think you are referring to. > But whether we need open source our test software.I did not find the > relevant instructions on the official website. The instructions are not special to Debian. If you want to redistribute a work derived from another work, that action is goverend by copyright law and you must obtain permission somehow. For free-software works, like all the ones that comprise the Debian system, the freedom is explicitly granted to redistribute the derived work with the same license conditions that you received the work. > We do not want to open source our software, because it will involve the > interests of some third-party vendors. That is a shame, because it is against the interests of software freedom and the interests of software users. Please grant recipients of the Debian system – with or without your modifications – the same grant of license that you received. -- \“It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.” | `\ —David Hume | _o__) | Ben Finney
Re: I am the RD of ASUS, want to confirm the Debian license
刘欢 wrote: > Dears, > > Sorry to use a private email,The company's mailbox can not send mail to @ > list.debian.org > > We are developing a laptop test software, hoping to use Debian as the > operating environment, and pre-installed in the user's computer. > According to Debian lisence, we do not have to pay for it, just open the > Debian source code we use. > But whether we need open source our test software.I did not find the > relevant instructions on the official website. > We do not want to open source our software, because it will involve the > interests of some third-party vendors. If you are using any packages from the 'non-free' or 'contrib' repositories, then you are going to have to look at the licenses of all of those packages. They can have all sorts of restrictions on what you can do. If you are using only packages from the 'main' repository, then Debian makes a good faith effort to make sure that everything in that repository complies with the Debian Free Software Guidelines. https://www.debian.org/social_contract This includes the clause 9. License Must Not Contaminate Other Software That will often cover the kind of use I think you are envisioning. Please note that Debian is largely a volunteer effort and does not guarantee that they did a good job vetting the licenses. With that said, it also somewhat depends on how your test software is written. For example, if your software links with GPL-licensed software, then you may be required to give out the source of your test software to anyone who gets the binaries. So what you want to do is at least plausible. What you need to do now is sit down with a lawyer and get answers specific to your situation. Because I am definitely not a lawyer. Hope that helps, Walter Landry wlan...@caltech.edu
I am the RD of ASUS, want to confirm the Debian license
Dears, Sorry to use a private email,The company's mailbox can not send mail to @ list.debian.org We are developing a laptop test software, hoping to use Debian as the operating environment, and pre-installed in the user's computer. According to Debian lisence, we do not have to pay for it, just open the Debian source code we use. But whether we need open source our test software.I did not find the relevant instructions on the official website. We do not want to open source our software, because it will involve the interests of some third-party vendors. thanks lot Br Harry
