Re: [PATCH] Enable writing to ATA devices, fix several bugs

[Marco Gerards]

Javier Martín <address@hidden> writes:

> El lun, 21-07-2008 a las 14:49 +0200, Marco Gerards escribió:
>> Pavel Roskin <address@hidden> writes:
>> 
>> > On Sun, 2008-07-20 at 20:55 +0200, Marco Gerards wrote:
>> >> Pavel Roskin <address@hidden> writes:
>> >
>> >> > I know.  That's why I'll write it from specifications or maybe I'll
>> >> > take it from the GNU/Hurd code.
>> >> 
>> >> Taking it from Specifications will be better.
>> >> 
>> >> I think the ATA driver of GNU Mach comes from Linux 2.0 or so.  So
>> >> that won't change anything for us ;(.
>> >
>> > I don't think choosing consistent names could be interpreted as a
>> > copyright violation (except by companies like SCO, but then all bets are
>> > off).
>> 
>> No, you are right.  But it means that you have a look at the Linux ATA
>> code.  If you copy Linux names into our code, people could claim that
>> we looked at Linux and based our code on it.
> So what? Aren't both Linux and GRUB under the GPL? That _should_ mean
> that we can look at their code and put it into GRUB ("create a
> derivative work") either as-is or modified.

For GRUB 2 we require copyright assignments.
 
>> > Anyway, if I ever have a chance to touch the GRUB ATA code again, I'll
>> > use FreeBSD as a reference.  Using specification is probably not the
>> > best idea because we need GRUB to work on the real life hardware, and we
>> > need to be prepared to handle known quirks in popular hardware.
>> 
>> We were talking about not looking at copyrighted code as a
>> reference...  But looking at FreeBSD would be better than looking at
>> Linux if we want to avoid possible copyright problems.
> I still don't understand this: the GPL includes an irrevocable grant as
> long as the license is obeyed. As for copyright problems, Linux has had
> several clashes (SCO et al), but in each and every instance people has
> raised against the attacker, defended Linux and won in court. I say it
> "offers" quite good copyright shielding.

This isn't about licenses.  This is about copyright.

--
Marco