Dear SystemC-forum and developers, Before I explain what the problem with Systemc's license is , let me first introduce my intentions. I am a community member of Fedora project. https://fedoraproject.org/ My contribution to this _non profit_ organisation is to make the deployment of opensource EDA tools easier, under the Fedora Electronic Lab umbrella. http://chitlesh.fedorapeople.org/FEL We are not in competition with other EDA vendors. Thereby I was packaging SystemC for Fedora. However, after consulting Red Hat Lawyers, Systemc's license is not valid to include it into Fedora's repositories. There is a third-party repository for fedora (not supported by the fedora project) : rpmfusion which deals with such licensing issues. http://rpmfusion.org/ I have spent many days trying to fix SystemC for gcc4, use dynamic libraries instead of static, ... etc. But the contributors behind the non-profit rpmfusion and I are worried about the distribution of Systemc. We have been in contact with Red Hat Lawyers to give us some advice on this matter. You will find below their recommendations. With this email, I am asking SystemC developers to please modify SystemC license in such a way that it makes distribution easier. Recently, Cadence and Mentors announced OVM is available under the Apache 2 license. Can Synopsys do the same with SystemC ? or at least a license which facilitates distribution. You will have all my work done (patches) on integrating SystemC in Fedora/Red Hat based linux operating systems. If SystemC's license is updated as I wish, I will work with SELinux developers to fix the memory flags that SELinux is blocking. My request in this email is to facilitate the tasks of everyone :- - me as a non-profit distributor - any fedora user will have SystemC well integrated in the linux distribution and he/she doesn't have to spend days compiling Systemc. - SystemC developers will have all my patches. However, if Systemc's developers reject my request, I will not distribute Systemc and abide to the legal terms. Below are some recommendations to update SystemC's license: This is specifically commenting on the current version 3.0 of the SystemC license. http://www.systemc.org/about/org_docs/license/ The most significant problem is section 2.7, concerning trademarks. I would suggest both of the following: (a) Eliminating 2.7 in its entirety. Trademark issues are dealt with adequately in section 2.5. However, another (redundant) possibility is to replace the existing 2.7 in its entirety with one sentence: This Agreement grants no permission to use the marks or logos of OSCI. (b) Sever Exhibit D completely from the license. There are other issues that might not rise to the level of non-free-ness but have been pointed out by the FSF as being problematic (and in some cases clarification of meaning or purpose would lead to the conclusion that the clauses in question make the license non-free). The following suggestions would address these: (a) Eliminate the following: PLEASE READ THIS LICENSE AGREEMENT CAREFULLY BEFORE CLICKING ON THE "ACCEPT" BUTTON, AS BY CLICKING ON THE "ACCEPT" BUTTON YOU ACKNOWLEDGE THAT YOU HAVE READ, UNDERSTOOD AND AGREE TO BE BOUND BY THIS LICENSE AGREEMENT AND ALL OF ITS TERMS AND CONDITIONS. (Note that there's other language that deals with acceptance below this language.) (b) In section 2.6, replace the term "proprietary notices" with "legal notices". (c) Replace section 5 with the following: Any Recipient which Distributes any Contribution and/or OSCI Release in a commercial offering (a "Commercial Distributor") may accept certain responsibilities with respect to end users, business partners and the like. While this license is intended to facilitate the commercial use of Contributions and OSCI Releases, a Commercial Distributor should do so in a manner which does not create potential liability for the Contributors. Therefore, each Commercial Distributor hereby agrees to defend and indemnify every Contributor ("Indemnified Contributor") against any losses, damages and costs (collectively "Losses") arising from claims, lawsuits and other legal actions brought by a third party against the Indemnified Contributor to the extent they directly result from the acts or omissions of such Commercial Distributor in connection with the terms and conditions under which the Commercial Distributor offered such Contributions and OSCI releases in a commercial product offering. The obligations in this Section 5 do not apply to any claims or Losses relating to any actual or alleged intellectual property infringement. In order to qualify, an Indemnified Contributor must: a) promptly notify the Commercial Distributor in writing of such claim, and b) allow the Commercial Distributor to control, and cooperate with the Commercial Distributor in, the defense and any related settlement negotiations. The Indemnified Contributor may participate in the defense of any such claim at its own expense. For example, a Recipient might include a Contribution in a commercial product offering, Product X. That Contributor is then a Commercial Distributor. If that Commercial Distributor then makes performance claims, or offers warranties, support or indemnity related to Product X, those performance claims, offers and other terms are such Commercial Distributor's responsibility alone. Under this Section 5, the Commercial Distributor would have to defend claims against the Contributors directly arising out of those performance claims, offers, and other terms, and if a court requires any Contributor to pay any damages as a result, the Commercial Distributor must pay those damages. Alternatively, and preferably, eliminate section 5 altogether. Kind regards, Chitlesh _______________________________________________ Fedora-electronic-lab-list mailing list Fedora-electronic-lab-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/fedora-electronic-lab-list
