Re: Licensing charges for X11R6.4

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Article #38419

#38419

From: Kaz Kylheku
Date: Wed, 08 Apr 1998 00:00

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In article <6ggboo$e93@george.sabre.com>,
Christopher Browne <cbbrowne@hex.net> wrote:
>e) Companies like Metro Link and Xi Graphics have been free to add in
>support for graphics cards that could not be added in a GPLed version
>due to NDAs.  (Perhaps the NDA is of questionable morality within the
>"free software community." It is nonetheless quite legal.)

That is not true if the core X code  were packaged as a separate component
from the proprietary drivers.  The drivers could be developed under an
NDA and shipped to the end-users in binary form, yet the end-users could
be allowed to recompile the pure X portions of the server.

The Linux kernel is GPL, but that doesn't mean that I can't go out and sign an
NDA in exchange for information about some peripheral, and then write a
loadable module that I distribute in binary form.

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From: bill@cafe.net (Kaz Kylheku)
Subject: Re: Licensing charges for X11R6.4
Date: 1998/04/08
Message-ID: <TYPW.74$XC5.451084@newsgate.direct.ca>
X-Deja-AN: 342160548
References: <6ft5un$mlv$1@woodstock.socs.uts.EDU.AU> <ysf90ph3gch.fsf@jaws.osf.org> <u1vhskms81.fsf@noisy.vggas.com> <6ggboo$e93@george.sabre.com>
NNTP-Posting-Date: Wed, 08 Apr 1998 12:10:43 PST
Reply-To: kaz@cafe.net
Organization: Internet Direct
Newsgroups: comp.windows.x,comp.os.linux.advocacy,comp.os.linux.x,comp.os.linux.development.system,gnu.misc.discuss

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