Xilinx License Acceptable for RTEMS?

[Chris Johns]

On 25/1/19 1:04 am, Sebastian Huber wrote:
> 
> some Xilinx drivers use this license:
> 
> /******************************************************************************
> *
> * Copyright (C) 2014 Xilinx, Inc.  All rights reserved.
> *
> * Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
> * of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
> * in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
> * to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
> * copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
> * furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
> *
> * The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
> * all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
> *
> * Use of the Software is limited solely to applications:
> * (a) running on a Xilinx device, or
> * (b) that interact with a Xilinx device through a bus or interconnect.
> *
> * THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
> * IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
> * FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL
> * XILINX  BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY,
> * WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF
> * OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
> * SOFTWARE.
> *
> * Except as contained in this notice, the name of the Xilinx shall not be used
> * in advertising or otherwise to promote the sale, use or other dealings in
> * this Software without prior written authorization from Xilinx.
> *
> ******************************************************************************/
> 
> It is an open source license, but it is has the following limitations:
> 
> "* Use of the Software is limited solely to applications:
> * (a) running on a Xilinx device, or
> * (b) that interact with a Xilinx device through a bus or interconnect."
> 

These conditions are not across all the code in the SDK 2018.3. I would check
specific versions. For example I found these conditions in

 2018.3/data/embeddedsw/lib/bsp/standalone_v6_1

and not in:

 2018.3/data/embeddedsw/lib/bsp/standalone_v6_8

> This is not a big deal for driver code intended for Xilinx devices. Would it be
> acceptable for the RTEMS repository?

I do not think we can have code with the conditions present in our repo. We
cannot enforce this clause and we do not have or ever will have a click through
with user details that lets us know who has taken the code.

I am attempting to get some clarification from Xilinx on this. We have been
working successfully with Xilinx in bringing about a change, it however takes
time. My brief review of standalone_v6_8 code is encouraging.

Chris