RE: Copyright assignment form

[Shahid Khan <shahidk@qti.qualcomm.com>]

Thanks for the info, Jim. 

Siddhesh,

Is there a separate copyright assignment for glibc or the same form works for both?

-Shahid 

-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Wilson [mailto:jimw@sifive.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, January 16, 2018 1:01 PM
To: Shahid Khan <shahidk@qti.qualcomm.com>; gcc@gcc.gnu.org
Cc: siddhesh@linaro.org
Subject: Re: Copyright assignment form

On 01/15/2018 03:11 PM, Shahid Khan wrote:
> Our team at Qualcomm Datacenter Technologies, Inc. is interested in contributing patches to the upstream GCC compiler project. To get the process started, we'd like to request a copyright assignment form as per contribution guidelines outlined at https://gcc.gnu.org/contribute.html.
> 
> Please let me know if there are additional steps we need to take to become an effective contributor to the GCC community.

You should contact assign@gnu.org directly.  The standard forms contain language about patents that Qualcomm lawyers are unlikely to be comfortable with, and may require negotiating a non-standard agreement. 
As best as I can tell, the FSF has never received a copyright assignment or disclaimer from Qualcomm.  If this is the first time Qualcomm lawyers are talking to the FSF, this will take a while.  I would not be surprised if this takes a year or two.  You will also need a VP level signature for the forms once you get approval from Qualcomm lawyers.

You may want to consider getting a disclaimer from your employer, and then filing personal assignments.  It is probably easier to get a disclaimer from Qualcomm than an assignment, but this requires more paperwork, since each individual contributing then needs their own personal assignment.  The disclaimers also have language about patents that the Qualcomm lawyers may not like, so while this should be easier, it is still likely a difficult process.

Siddhesh can help you with this as the rules for gcc are the same as for glibc.

Jim