[coreboot] Coreboot BSD-style Open Source licence (was: Re: Coreboot or UEFI, who will be the winner.)

Christian Leber christian.leber at ziti.uni-heidelberg.de
Sat Dec 26 20:53:47 CET 2009


On Saturday 26 December 2009 01:55:02 Cristi Magherusan wrote:

Hello Cristi
 
> Intel chose not to use coreboot just because it won't protect its IP the
> way their closed-source part of EFI does.

So why should it matter in any way for coreboot if Intel (or another company) 
would be able to make use of coreboot code for free and give nothing back?

There are other reasons than their "valuable IP" that i don't know. Because 
any competing company that cares how Intel initializes memory or sets up the 
northbridge etc. will be able to find out. There is just nothing to hide in 
systems sold millions of times in many different versions.

> So their Trusted Platform is
> actually promoting security by obscurity instead of openness, like most
> of the people are doing nowadays.

That is a very smart argument, the minor problem is just that it would not be 
open if they would not be required to publish source.


Christian Leber




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