[coreboot] libpayload for ARM with sprinklings of GPL and coreboot code sharing

Stefan Reinauer stefan.reinauer at coreboot.org
Tue Mar 25 05:33:44 CET 2014


* mrnuke <mr.nuke.me at gmail.com> [140320 23:57]:
> Proposal:
>  * Share these drivers between coreboot and libpayload.
>  * libpayload is BSD. Have a "[ ] Enable GPL features" config option which 	
> 	"unlocks" the GPL'd drivers from coreboot.
>  * libpayload core remains BSD.
>  * coreboot drivers are available to GPL users of libpayload
>  * Both the licensing of libpayload-core and coreboot is maintained/respected
>  * Makes maintenance easier
>  * Makes libpayload relevant in the ARM space

In the chromium repo we've had an effort to replace the GPLed ARM parts
with BSD licensed counterparts.

For stuff we wrote from scratch double licensing is easy, but certainly
some drivers we'd like to use from other projects (like u-boot) are a
lot of work to be rewritten.
For ChromeOS firmware we tried working around that by bundling the
drivers with depthcharge (the payload) because it's GPL.

I don't really know of any non-GPLed users of libpayload, so definitely
relicensing libpaylod might be on the table.

In the short term having a GPL enabling Kconfig seems like an option.
Or we take the effort of rewriting those pieces BSD licensed. The
question is: Is there anybody out there caring enough about non-GPLed
payloads to put in the effort.

Stefan







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