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XboxDev / nxdk

The cross-platform, open-source SDK to develop for original Xbox: *new* xdk
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License information for "network stack" in README is incomplete #317

Open JayFoxRox opened 4 years ago

JayFoxRox commented 4 years ago

The README implies that the network stack using lwIP is "License: Modified BSD".

However, this is not complete. The stack is also using pktdrv, which is AFL 2.0 licensed. This would be important as AFL is incompatible with the GPL.

Personally I don't believe that pktdrv can even be AFL licensed, considering it's obviously decompiled/disassembled from the MS kernel, or based on MMIO traces. It's probably legally sketchy to begin with, but also mostly factual (i.e. non-copyrightable).

Even if it was based on the "forcedeth Linux nForce driver" as it claims (even though it looks nothing alike), then it would be GPLv2+, not AFL.

Anyhow, as-is, we should document that pktdrv is AFL, or we should cleanup pktdrv and slap something more open on it (like CC0 with disclaimer about the roots of it), assuming the original author almost certainly had no right to put their license on it either.

thrimbor commented 4 years ago

I think the forcedeth comment refers exclusively to the constant definitions. I don't think this drags in the GPLv2, it's basically just giving names to values. I'm personally not sure about the origin of the code, but afair the MS code did TX descriptor chaining, which Pktdrv doesn't support (currently)? I'm not very familiar with MS's network stack, though.

The init code is probably non-copyrightable, and I'm currently changing quite a bit of the other code. It'll probably be fine to put another license on it then - I'd personally prefer if we get approval by the original author, but I don't think that's likely to happen.

DobaMuffin commented 3 years ago

What is currently going on with pktdrv? I know it's still AFL V2, but I'm wondering if there are any other pieces of software that can be adapted for the nxdk.