Re: [ECOS] Possible GPL violation

[Gary Thomas <gary@mlbassoc.com>]

On 01/18/2010 12:24 PM, Jonas Gorski wrote:
> Hello,
>
> I have obtained a system running redboot, without any sources for
> redboot. Since I am not sure whether I am entitled to the source code,
> I will not disclose the vendor for now.
>
> The redboot itself claims to be version 0.9; also, it claims to be a
> certified release. This could mean that this was a pre-gpl redboot,
> but the system is quite recent, and the redboot was built in 2009.
> Also, the redhat copyright header goes until 2004.
>
> Also, strings yields these lines:
>
> Can't read ELF header
> Only absolute ELF images supported
> Short data reading ELF file
> *** Abort! Attempt to load ELF data to address: %p which is not in RAM
> Can't load ELF file - program headers out of order
> Can't read ELF program header
> Image is not ELF, skipping ELF parsing...
> Only absolute ELF images supported
> *** Abort! Attempt to load ELF data to address: %p which is not in RAM
> Short data reading ELF file
>
> which seems to indicate that this at least contains code from redboot
> 2.0 or later.
>
> My question now is: could this still be licensed under an other
> license, as the 2.0 sources of redboot state that "alternative
> licenses for eCos may be arranged by contacting RedHat, Inc.", or does
> this have to be GPL, and therefore should I have access to the source
> code?
>
> Best Regards,
> Jonas Gorski
>
> P.S: I did try to contact the vendor by email, but they did not
> respond. Also they stated publically that they would not release the
> source code of their boot loaders.
>

This discussion should be on the eCos maintainer's list - CC'd

Jonas - for us to have any idea about this, we'd need to know
the vendor, model, etc.  RedBoot has never had a version such
as "0.9" except from OEMs (e.g. Intel uses numbers like that)

Once we have some basic data, we can help you look into this.

-- 
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Gary Thomas                 |  Consulting for the
MLB Associates              |    Embedded world
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