Re: Octave - instrument control option

[Julien Salort]

Le 26 juin 2012 à 11:24, Jacob Dawid a écrit :

> Julien,
> 
> for legal issues please consider asking the fsf/a lawyer.
> 
> However, probably we could work on getting rid of the dependencies on
> proprietary software in your code.

It's true that we could use libgpib instead of NI-488.2.
I'm unsure what would be the equivalent of NI-VISA.

There are other legal questions that are not GPL related:
- I've written support for the various instruments that I use (eg. Keithley 
2000, Agilent 34970A, ...). 
I don't know if these manufacturers allow third-parties to distribute "drivers" 
for those instruments. 
- Additionnally, I have only implemented a subset of their functions (depending 
on my personnal needs).
Is this a problem ?
- And finally, what if a bug in my code leads to some accident in some place ?
(eg. someone who would use this code to control some piece of equipment and a 
bug leads to something bad on this costy equipment or the people around. Would 
I be legally responsible ?)

Julien