Licensing for commercial use

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Questions:
Can I use qextserialport in a commercial product?
If yes, how?
Compile it in? I guess no.
If I can use it as a library, how should the README be formulated?
Is the "MIT license" from 2008 appropriate?

Bengt Nilson

Original issue reported on code.google.com by bengt.ni...@spray.se on 3 Aug 2009 at 7:44

[GoogleCodeExporter]

> Can I use qextserialport in a commercial product?

Funny, this question had been around for a couple of years now, and I was still 
not
able to find a clear license statement in the package. However, the new homepage
states "New BSD License", but I don't know what to fill in for the blanks in the
license statement.
The following thread from 2004 declares (AFAI understood it) that the intention 
of
the original author was that the package should be available as public domain, 
free
for all purposes, so IMHO the BSD license should be a rather sensible choice 
both in
terms of liberty and legal security. I'm currently using QextSerialPort 
compiled into
a commercial product (with approval of my employer), and if anyone tells me 
what to
display in the About page of my application I would be happy to include it.

http://lists.trolltech.com/qt-interest/2004-12/msg01022.html
http://www.qtcentre.org/forum/f-qt-programming-2/t-qextserialport-license-16722.
html

Original comment by Martin.G...@alpha-bit.de on 4 Aug 2009 at 1:45

[GoogleCodeExporter]

For the record, currently I'm displaying, in the style of the Qwt project, the
following text, and I would take it as adequate until a project maintainer 
objects to it:

"This application is based in part on the work of the QextSerialPort project (<a
href=\"http://code.google.com/p/qextserialport/\">http://code.google.com/p/qexts
erialport/</a>)."

Original comment by Martin.G...@alpha-bit.de on 4 Aug 2009 at 2:06

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I think Martin's attribution seems sensible.  We could perhaps create a wiki 
page with a few more notes on 
licensing, but I think the general "do whatever you like with it" / public 
domain approach is about right.

Original comment by lst...@gmail.com on 4 Aug 2009 at 7:14

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Would it be possible that you add a filled out "New BSB license" statement to 
the
repository? This would make it easier to argue with the legal department if this
license statement would exist and we would have something to display in the 
About
page. The "do whatever you like with it" statement does not satisfy every legal
department.

Original comment by andi.bac...@gmail.com on 15 Feb 2010 at 5:15

[GoogleCodeExporter]

I propose to use the MIT License 
(http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license). See the following article to 
capture the problem with "public domain": 
http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/6225
The best would be to simple adding a "LICENSE" (e.g. the one attached) file to 
the source root dir:

The MIT License

Copyright (c) <year> <copyright holders>

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
THE SOFTWARE.

Original comment by tobias.p...@okr-paul.de on 20 May 2011 at 7:55

Attachments:

• LICENCE

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Another request to add a COPYING / LICENSE file to the repository.
That would make it a lot easier to determine the license used.

Original comment by anders.d...@gmail.com on 4 Jul 2011 at 11:08

[GoogleCodeExporter]

Original comment by dbzhang...@gmail.com on 16 Mar 2012 at 8:39

• Changed state: Done