Re: porting Grub to Xen

[Vladimir 'phcoder' Serbinenko]

On Tue, Jun 16, 2009 at 12:20 PM, Ferenc Wagner <address@hidden> wrote:

"Vladimir 'phcoder' Serbinenko" <address@hidden> writes:

> On Fri, Jun 5, 2009 at 9:37 PM, Ferenc Wagner<address@hidden> wrote:
>> "Vladimir 'phcoder' Serbinenko" <address@hidden> writes:
>>
>>>> Neither have I, but xen-devel says MiniOS is BSD, and should be
>>>> acceptable for Grub.
>>>
>>> If it's under MIT or new BSD license it is. However no code with
>>> unclear licensing can be used in grub2
>>
>> The mini-os code has been reviewed and gained an explicit BSD license
>> just now to clear this issue up.
>
> Can you post the link? There are different BSD licenses and we need to
> check that it's really compatible.

xen-unstable.hg/extras/minios/COPYING contains the following:

Copyright (c) 2009 Citrix Systems, Inc. All rights reserved.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
are met:
1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
  notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
  notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
  documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY AUTHOR AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
ARE DISCLAIMED.  IN NO EVENT SHALL AUTHOR OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
SUCH DAMAGE.

This license is GPLv3 compatible and as such can be linked with grub2. To incorporate to grub2 a non-originl code we would need a maintainer or co-maintainer approval. In any case it won't be merged unless you present something which actually works (e.g. shows menu in xen w/o need of MiniOS). I haven't tested your patch at all because I still haven't familarized myself with xen. I recommend to setup a your own repository under repo.or.cz and upload there your WIP.
I also inform you that if someone wants to reimplement it we would prefer a reimplementation

>
> They can be used only if they didn't drop "or later" clause of grub1's

> license and only under same terms as BSD code.

OMG.  Who/what are the two "they"s above?  But only if it's really
important.  This legal stuff is such a drag..

The patches released with xen contain no license header. Unless XenSource clearly states that  grub patches is under gplv2+ you can't use this code directly or indirectly and shouldn't even look at it. You can take the code from MiniOS though if the license attached to it is the one you posted in your e-mail. Be sure to mark copied parts as such.
It's not my decision if current amount of uncertainty and BSDL code resage is ok, it's not my decision. But even if it isn't added to mainstream it is still a nice feature to have and yo can distribute your code through other channels

.
--
Thanks,

Feri.


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-- 
Regards
Vladimir 'phcoder' Serbinenko