[lsb-discuss] LSB conf call notes for 2008-07-30
R P Herrold
herrold at owlriver.com
Fri Aug 8 12:28:32 PDT 2008
On Fri, 8 Aug 2008, Theodore Tso wrote:
> I don't think it's a problem for us, because we will be mandating
> something which passes the TCK (regardless of whether we integrate the
> TCK into the LSB tests or whether we just ask the distributor to
> assert that it passes the TCK).
I read this during the call, but here it is again:
---------------start disclaimer-------------------
I_A_AL, but not your lawyer. I offer legal advice and formal
opinion only within the confines of a previously established
and explicit attorney-client relationship where privilege may
be had; and NEVER on a public list server.
----------------end disclaimers ------------------
Let's review the bidding, as Ted was not on the call this
week.
The license document in question is: openjdk-tck-license.pdf
from http://openjdk.java.net/ -- documents live here:
http://openjdk.java.net/legal/
1.9 "Technology Compatibility Kit" or "TCK" means the Test
Suite and related documentation, for example, the TCK Users
Guide, as made available to Licensee and may be revised by Sun
during the Term, associated with the Java Specification and
that are provided so that Licensee may determine if its
Implementation is compliant with the Specification.
5.0 CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION
5.1 Duty of Confidentiality. Licensee will protect the TCK as
Sun Confidential Information protected under this Section 5.0.
A party receiving Confidential Information may not: (i)
disclose Confidential Information to any third party other
than another party bound by an OpenJDK Community TCK License
Agreement v. 1.x (and provided that any Confidential
Information disclosed by Licensee to such party shall be
provided under such Agreement and subject to Section 5 of the
recipient's OpenJDK TCK License Agreement v 1.x); or (ii) use
Confidential Information except for the purpose of developing
and testing Licensee Implementations. ...
6.0 LIMITATION OF LIABILITY
Except for violation of Sun's Intellectual Property Rights, or
breach of Section 2.0: (a) each party's liability to the other
for claims relating to this Agreement, whether for breach or
in tort, shall be limited to [inapplicable, as we ARE into
asserted "Sun's Intellectual Property Rights"] ...
> (And if Sun's lawyers decide to go after those distributions
> with scarry cease-or-we- sue-the-pants-off-of-you letters,
> particularly with non-commercial distro's such as Gentoo,
> Debian, etc. --- the LSB wouldn't be involved, and we can
> just stand back and watch the Slashdot bonfire from a
> distance. :-)
So, exposing people to an NDA, and potentially unlimited
liability, and defense costs, in order to be be able to
test and demonstrate their distribution is LSB complaint is
fine?
I think not. I think the LSB cannot in good conscience place
distributions in the line of fire, until and unless the
testing tool is not a 'spring gun'.
'Java' is clearly asserted to be Sun's trademark:
http://www.sun.com/policies/trademarks/
"Java is a trademark when it identifies a software product,"
These are variously objective realities, or my $0.02 personal
takeaways. Each person has to find their own path.
I mentioned CentOS position (our user base want Java -- Suns or
another, all the time -- We would _like_ to have it trivial to
install properly) and 'indemnification' during the call, as I
was getting Ray Gans and Onno Kluyt's named (I'd appreciate
email addresses to go with those.)
Attn: Dalibor Topic: help please. An email to
herrold at owlriver.com would be appreciated.
Clearly recent statements from Sun have reiterated and
ratified the 'indemnification' aspect being intentionally
present in their licenses:
http://java.sun.com/reference/stealourcode/index.html
You are free to use this source code for any purpose,
commercial or non-commercial, as long as you indemnify the
authors and Sun Microsystems, Inc., from any consequences of
its use.
The (2006) DLJ, and DLJ FQ 1.3 seem pretty direct to me:
http://download.java.net/dlj/DLJ-v1.1.pdf
http://download.java.net/dlj/DLJ-FAQ.pdf
The License (sorry this is such a nasty run-on ... I added
some CR's and tabs to make it readable):
2. LICENSE GRANT. Subject to the terms and conditions of this
Agreement, as well as the restrictions and exceptions set
forth in the Software README file, Sun grants you a
non-exclusive, non-transferable, royalty-free limited license
to reproduce and use the Software internally, complete and
unmodified, for the sole purposes of running Programs and
designing, developing and testing Programs.
Sun also grants you a non-exclusive, non-transferable,
royalty-free limited license to reproduce and distribute the
Software, directly or indirectly through your licensees,
distributors, resellers, or OEMs, electronically or in
physical form or pre-installed with your Operating System on a
general purpose desktop computer or server, provided that:
(a) the Software and any proprietary legends or
notices are complete and unmodified;
(b) the Software is distributed with your Operating
System, and such distribution is solely for the purposes of
running Programs under the control of your Operating System
and designing, developing and testing Programs to be run under
the control of your Operating System;
(c) you do not combine, configure or distribute the
Software to run in conjunction with any additional software
that implements the same or similar functionality or APIs as
the Software;
(d) you do not remove or modify any included license
agreement or impede or prevent it from displaying and
requiring acceptance;
(e) you only distribute the Software subject to this
license agreement; and
(f) you agree to defend and indemnify Sun and its
licensors from and against any damages, costs, liabilities,
settlement amounts and/or expenses (including attorneys' fees)
incurred in connection with any claim, lawsuit or action by
any third party that arises or results from
(i) the use or distribution of your Operating
System, or any part thereof, in any manner, or
(ii) your use or distribution of the Software
in violation of the terms of this Agreement or applicable law.
---- paragraph ends -------
and the FAQ:
· Indemnify Sun against claims arising from your OS or your
violation of the DLJ (or any applicable law) Note that you
are not responsible for changes made to your OS distribution
by downstream users or distributors when such changes are out
of your control.
(later)
· Ship only a compatible JDK on your OS. If notified
of an incompatibility, you must correct it and offer a
patch or replacement to downstream recipients within
90 days, or stop shipment and notify downstream recipients.
Combination with, or combined distribution with a competing
successor 'java-like' program (the existing prior efforts, and
"OpenJDK") looks like a pretty clear violation to me:
(c) you do not combine, configure or
distribute the Software to run in conjunction with any
additional software that implements the same or similar
functionality or APIs as the Software;
I would be delighted to have the indemnification and
exclusivity clauses deleted, but ... hasn't happened yet.
I'll ask formally with Gans or Kluyt's contact details.
CentOS have concluded that the indemnification and
exclusivity clauses on redistributing Sun's Java is already a
risk we won't undertake.
LSB needs to decide how much and what kinds of risk
[contractual NDA, contractual indemnification, trademark
infringement, patent, copyright, more?] it is willing to ask
distributions to expose themselves to, to become 'LSB
compliant'.
-- Russ herrold
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