[U-Boot] [PATCH] drivers/ddr/fsl: Dual-license DDR driver

[York Sun]

On 02/13/2018 12:09 PM, Marek Vasut wrote:
> On 02/13/2018 08:33 PM, York Sun wrote:
>> On 02/13/2018 11:16 AM, Marek Vasut wrote:
>>> On 02/13/2018 07:32 PM, York Sun wrote:
>>>> On 02/13/2018 09:38 AM, Marek Vasut wrote:
>>>>> On 02/13/2018 05:30 PM, York Sun wrote:
>>>>>> On 02/13/2018 04:49 AM, Wolfgang Denk wrote:
>>>>>>> Dear York,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In message <VI1PR04MB20785EF7D2578E39C048EE219AF70 at VI1PR04MB2078.eurprd04.prod.outlook.com> you wrote:
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Nobody said anything. Some addresses bounced. And most changes made out
>>>>>>>> people outside Freescale/NXP are minor changes, except twice the files
>>>>>>>> were moved during U-Boot structure change. What options do I have?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Ask all people who contributed to that code for their explicit
>>>>>>> permission.  Legally it is a huge difference between actively
>>>>>>> confirming approval and not reacting at all.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> All,
>>>>>>
>>>>>> If you haven't responded, please give your explicit approval to change
>>>>>> Freescale DDR driver to dual-license so it can be re-used by other
>>>>>> project(s) with BSD license. Here is the list I compiled from the git
>>>>>> history. All commits made by Freescale/NXP employees are removed from
>>>>>> this list.
>>>>>
>>>>> [...]
>>>>>
>>>>>> cd84b1f - Marek Vasut, marek.vasut at gmail.com, 6 years ago : GCC4.6:
>>>>>> Squash warnings in ddr[123]_dimm_params.c
>>>>>
>>>>> I do NOT approve.
>>>>>
>>>>> My previous experience with dual-licensed code was with wpa-supplicant.
>>>>> A certain company manufacturing handhelds took it, modified it and was
>>>>> selling the binary. While we were porting Linux onto the device, we
>>>>> asked for the modifications to get the WiFi operational in the Linux port.
>>>>>
>>>>> What we got from this company was "it's BSD licensed, go away". Were the
>>>>> code GPL, they would be legally obliged to provide the changes, but it
>>>>> was BSD, so the company in question could make profit and the community
>>>>> lost.
>>>>>
>>>>> This was a prime example of how BSD license is harmful to software
>>>>> freedom and how the community lost because of the BSD license. I do not
>>>>> want to see this happening ever again and I like GPL for that very much.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Marek,
>>>>
>>>> Please allow me to try to convince you.
>>>> Git log shows you have one commit cd84b1f which fixed the compiling
>>>> warning for GCC 4.6 on three debug messages. I appreciate your fix.
>>>>
>>>> This driver is for Freescale/NXP DDR controllers, specifically designed
>>>> on Freescale/NXP SoCs. We spent tremendous effort to make it robust.
>>>> This driver is useful to initialize DDR for the platforms. While we are
>>>> moving the platform initialization to ATF (Arm Trusted Firmware), or
>>>> other pre-bootloader code (such as NXP's implementation of ATF), this
>>>> driver can be reused to provide the same level of hardware support. As
>>>> you may know, ATF uses BSD-3 license (some files have GPL/BSD dual
>>>> licnese). Your approval will make our life easier without having to
>>>> rewrite the entire driver from scratch.
>>>
>>> So what is in it for me ?
>>
>> You may have the flexibility to use ATF or other pre-bootloader software
>> _if_ we successfully upstream this driver to ATF project.
> 
> It also allows you to just distribute binaries of the ATF without
> releasing the source.
> 
>>> If the code remains GPL, I can ask NXP for changes to the driver if I
>>> have the binary which contains this code.
>>>
>>> If the code gets re-licensed to dual GPL/BSD, I assume in certain cases,
>>> NXP will choose BSD and will not be obliged to provide the changes.
>>
>> Guess who makes substantial changes to the hardware driver? The people
>> with extensive knowledge of the hardware design. It's not our interest
>> to hide our design from any users.
>>
>>> I don't see any benefit for me, any way I look at it, I'm either even or
>>> loose .
>>
>> If we don't find a way to reuse this driver, I will have to write a new
>> driver. It's not easy to keep two different drivers in sync. So _this_
>> driver will probably be left behind. I don't think that's in anyone's
>> interest.
>>
>>>
>>> Why can't you use the code under the current (GPL) license anyway ?
>>>
>>
>> Do you think the GPL driver can be added to ATF project? I don't think
>> so. So it is a matter of we either can have it in ATF, or we can't.
> 
> Well, it seems this patch was applied to U-Boot master anyway [1], even
> though there are concerns and ongoing discussion ... so I lost anyway.
> 
> I am _extremely_ disappointed !

I take the responsibility for requesting the pull without getting your
approval in time. I am still trying to convince you it is right to use
dual license on this driver. Do you want to continue the discussion?

York