GPL and NDA

Hello,

I have a question regarding GPL and NDA issue.

I have documents for a specific chipset which I get  with NDA. 
And I'm trying to port Linuxbios on that chipset. 
As LinuxBIOS is GPL, I know I must make my port publicly available. 
In this case, Is it a violation of NDA or not? Does it depend on NDA?

I think there are many people on this list who were in similar situation. 
So please tell me some advice.

-
HeeChul Yun,          
Embedded S/W Team at ETRI
phone: [phone]

[Stefan Reinauer]

* [e-mail]  [030331 12:17]:
> I have documents for a specific chipset which I get  with NDA. 
> And I'm trying to port Linuxbios on that chipset. 
> As LinuxBIOS is GPL, I know I must make my port publicly available. 
> In this case, Is it a violation of NDA or not? Does it depend on NDA?

This depends on the NDA you signed. Some companies for example agree
that code that has been derived from NDA documentation may be released
under GPL as long as it does not reveal major documentation or features
that are actually not needed to get things going. You should definitely
clarify this before releasing, better before writing any code, and,
if possible, get this explicitly stated in the NDA or other contracts 
you sign. IANAL ;)

Stefan

[Ronald G Minnich]

On Mon, 31 Mar 2003 [e-mail] wrote:
> I have documents for a specific chipset which I get  with NDA. 
> And I'm trying to port Linuxbios on that chipset. 
> As LinuxBIOS is GPL, I know I must make my port publicly available. 
> In this case, Is it a violation of NDA or not? Does it depend on NDA?

- you can build GPL code based on NDA chipsets, but you MUST get the 
  permission to do that from the holder of the GPL
- it is a violation of the NDA if you release GPL code without
  getting permission
- you do not have to release your GPL code if you never release your
  linuxbios to anyone outside ETRI. You only have to release code
  if you release object
- If I were you I would consider using a different chipset if you can not
  get the vendor to agree.

ron

[Justin Cormack]

On Tue, 2003-04-01 at 02:25, Ronald G Minnich wrote:
> On Mon, 31 Mar 2003 [e-mail] wrote:
> > I have documents for a specific chipset which I get  with NDA. 
> > And I'm trying to port Linuxbios on that chipset. 
> > As LinuxBIOS is GPL, I know I must make my port publicly available. 
> > In this case, Is it a violation of NDA or not? Does it depend on NDA?
> you can build GPL code based on NDA chipsets, but you MUST get the 
> permission to do that from the holder of the GPL

er, typo, holder of specification
> it is a violation of the NDA if you release GPL code without
> getting permission
> you do not have to release your GPL code if you never release your
> linuxbios to anyone outside ETRI. You only have to release code
> if you release object
> If I were you I would consider using a different chipset if you can not
> get the vendor to agree.

Or if you never want to do business with them again, just ignore the
NDA. They have no legal force in some countries (eg the UK).

But I would avaoid them if at all possible. There are always other
manufacturers, and no one else will be able to help you with
development.

Justin

[Antony Stone]

On Monday 31 March 2003 5:58 pm, Justin Cormack wrote:
> Or if you never want to do business with them again, just ignore the
> NDA. They have no legal force in some countries (eg the UK).

Can you elaborate on that?   If they have no legal force, why do people use 
them (and yes, I have been on both ends of NDAs in the UK).

Regards,

Antony

[Stefan Reinauer]

* Justin Cormack  [030331 18:58]:
> On Tue, 2003-04-01 at 02:25, Ronald G Minnich wrote:
> > you can build GPL code based on NDA chipsets, but you MUST get the 
> > permission to do that from the holder of the GPL
>
> er, typo, holder of specification

both should be ok. As the holder of the GPL is the one that has to
enforce it, it might be sufficient to get a permission from the license
holder to only release a binary. (Which is still not a good idea, wrt
open source)
> Or if you never want to do business with them again, just ignore the
> NDA. They have no legal force in some countries (eg the UK).

After a couple of times you might run into problems finding new
manufacturers. ;)

Stefan

[Antony Stone]

On Monday 31 March 2003 7:15 pm, Stefan Reinauer wrote:
> Justin Cormack  [030331 18:58]:
> > On Tue, 2003-04-01 at 02:25, Ronald G Minnich wrote:
> > > you can build GPL code based on NDA chipsets, but you MUST get the
> > > permission to do that from the holder of the GPL
> >
> > er, typo, holder of specification
>
> both should be ok. As the holder of the GPL is the one that has to
> enforce it, it might be sufficient to get a permission from the license
> holder to only release a binary. (Which is still not a good idea, wrt
> open source)

This would then be a violation of the GPL.   If you produce something based 
on GPL code, you must distribute the source (or make it available) as well as 
the binary.   There's no such thing as binary-only GPL code.

If you think violating the GPL is not such a bad idea....

http://www.open-mag.com/features/Vol_24/GPL/gpl.htm

Antony.

[ron minnich]

On Mon, 31 Mar 2003, Antony Stone wrote:
> This would then be a violation of the GPL.   If you produce something based 
> on GPL code, you must distribute the source (or make it available) as well as 
> the binary.   There's no such thing as binary-only GPL code.

yes, and to reiterate, if you never distribute binary, then you don't have 
to distribute source. E.g. IBM never released the linuxbios code they 
wrote for an SiS chipset as the project got cancelled.

ron

[ron minnich]

On 31 Mar 2003, Justin Cormack wrote:
> > you can build GPL code based on NDA chipsets, but you MUST get the 
> > permission to do that from the holder of the GPL
>
> er, typo, holder of specification

yeah, sorry!

ron

[e-mail] writes:
> Hello,
>
> I have a question regarding GPL and NDA issue.
>
> I have documents for a specific chipset which I get  with NDA. 
> And I'm trying to port Linuxbios on that chipset. 
> As LinuxBIOS is GPL, I know I must make my port publicly available. 
> In this case, Is it a violation of NDA or not? Does it depend on NDA?

Violating the spirit of an NDA has business consequences, regardless of
the legal ones so keeping good faith is necessary.

But that runs two ways.  If you a customer cannot use their product because
of NDA issues you have leverage to work out the issue with manufacturer
of the hardware.

In general a NDA does not preclude you from working on a chipset.

In many cases there are extra constrains to releasing code before the
hardware is publicly available.  So a source/binary release may need
to wait until the official launch of a product.

In all cases you can develop code and not release either the source
or the binary while you have an NDA.  And that meets the terms of the
GPL.

For source code release the stipulation is that anyone who can get the
binary needs a means to get the source.

In a practical sense I have not yet seen hardware where knowing how to
program it appears to reveal how to build it.  Which is what I would
suspect manufacturers would be worried about.

Most NDA issues I have seen have come out of business NDA reflex and
can usually be resolved.  It also helps in the business arguments that
alternative suppliers of competing hardware have been successfully
worked with so you can threaten to switch hardware or even switch
hardware if you cannot use a piece of hardware because of NDA issues.

Also people tend to be particularly prickly NDA wise on the top of the
line hardware.  In most cases embedded products are a commodity and
volume market, with more custom systems being built.  So on the
embedded side I would expect the NDA issues to be easier to overcome.

Eric