Re: changes made/thanks (re hardware designs)

[Ian Carr-de Avelon <ian@emit.pl>]

>I am not sure what the "OpenNDA" means, but it sounds like something I
>would call non-free. 
The idea is this: the GPL works because a programmer holds copyright
on their work and so the GPL just adds rights to the user. There is
doubt whether a hardware designer holds equivalent rights if they put
designs available for FTP (say). You (for one) have stated that they do 
not. So; we will make and NDA which says that we accept that a hardware 
design is a hardware design and not a wall paper design. If you change 
it so it looks different, that does not matter the important thing is 
whether it is still a design for the same hardware. Everyone who is 
prepared to accept this agreement can sign it and then be given
access to hardware designs.
This will allow for 2 things:
1) Availability of designs to propriatory hardware on line, which you
may not copy, but can use for: selection for purchase, repairs, 
modifications and designing interfaces to equipment you have bought.
2) Designs available on line which you can use like GPL software and
which you can modify and pass on, like GPL software, provided that
those who receive it have also agreed that they accept a design is
a design and the orignator is allowing you to use it, but didn't have
to.
2 places hardware designers in the same situation as the GPL, yes we
are forcing people to sign a document, but it is simply a Bill of Rights
which puts hardware designers on  level with programmers. I beleive
that you should call it "Free" and support it. 
1 is not free, but it is helpfull to getting the OpenNDA accepted and
having cash to fight for its validity. It is also a huge step forward.
You have said that hardware interfaces must be open for the free 
software movement to program them. The only really open specification of
the interface is the hardware design. As an example of this, look at the
discusion on www.linmodems.org about whether the chips in winmodems
could be used at higher speed under Linux (sorry GNU/Linux). Nobody
knows; what the chip does at higher speeds is undefined in the chip
specification (if you can get it!) the chip design would allow you to 
simulate and find out.

> It would be impossible to sell these boards
>in a store in the ordinary way, since you cannot make people
>sign a contract for them.
They can buy the boards just like they buy PCs and cards now. If they
sign the NDA, they can have the design as well.
 
>
>Combining a drawing or HDL program covered by such a license with a
>drawing or HDL program covered by the GPL would definitely violate the
>GPL.
Will you be taking anyone who makes PCs with the GPL SPARC to court
if they don't provide GPL HDL for every chip and PCB in the system? 
Could some or all the rest of the design be open under another system? 
If not, why not?
There are CDs with GPL and propriatory software (including Windows NT, I read)
why can't there be PCBs with GPL chips and OpenNDA chips? or even
single pieces of silicon with GPL processor and OpenNDA interfaces?


>
>Anything copyrightable that *contains* part of the GPL-covered design
>has to be released under the GPL; this means you cannot make a larger
>combination including that GPL-covered part, unless the other parts
>have licenses compatible with the GPL.
You say that the hardware design is not copyright.

>
>You might decide that you don't think it is a real problem that these
>designs can't be combined with GPL-covered designs.  But putting aside
>that issue, to call something free which is covered by an NDA is a horrible
>idea.  I hope this will not catch on.
I reiterate we are just putting hardware designs on a level with programs.
 
>
>If a trade secret becomes public knowledge, then the NDA which
>formerly applied to it do not apply any more.  If anyone posts a
>circuit drawing on a news group, that would make it public knowledge.
>You could sue the person who posted it for damages, if you can
>identify any financial damages and if you can identify the person.
>But that would not change the fact that the information is no longer
>covered by the NDA.
I am not a lawyer, but I understand courts have given orders to stop 
companies using know-how which they should not have received, because it
was covered by an NDA. Ie. you are not only limited to taking action against
the person who has signed and broken the NDA. In any case all you are saying
here is that people brake the law and the justice system does not offer a
perfect remedy. It is no different to someone braking the law by modifying
GPL code and distributing it as a propriatry binary. That is also someone
braking the law, but again you may not in the end find them and succede in
getting them punished. 
This is not a perfect system, it does not get us 100% of what we want, but
it gets us as close as I can see that we can get, without lobying every 
government in the world to treat software like hardware.  

Yours
Ian