Xilinx Legal
in [FPGA]
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From: Kolja Sulimma on 31 Jan 2006 07:00 Austin Lesea schrieb: > All: > > From our legal group- > Also, the bitstream created by using Xilinx software is owned > by Xilinx can only be used on Xilinx programmable products, for example, > FPGAs. LOL, ROTFL. Xilinx owns the bitstream? And Microsoft owns my PhD thesis because I typed it in Word? Wait, I created a PDF with Acrobat, so the PDF is owned by Adobe. But it was created from a file owned by Microsoft, so now Microsoft needs to sue Adobe. Sorry Austin, that is complete nonsense. Xilinx can not own a file that contains IP both from me an third parties. A shared ownership might be possible but I really doubt that. There was a case about two years back were a computer game manufacturer claimed that it owned level files created by an editor delivered with a game. They lost the case. Please have you legal department read up the first sale principle and have them think again whether they can restrict what a private customer does with the output of the tools. And after they checked that for the US, have them recheck for scandinavian countries. Kolja Sulimma BTW: If I typed my HDL in the ISE editor, can I still publish it under GPL (according to your legal department)
From: Brian Drummond on 31 Jan 2006 08:14 On 30 Jan 2006 15:28:41 -0800, cs_posting(a)hotmail.com wrote: >John Williams wrote: > >> What you've now created is a hybrid license, incompatible with the pure >> GPL (ok, so you can't host it on sourceforge, no big deal). If someone >> uses the tool to target an Altera part, then they are breaking the >> conditions of their license and it is therefore immediately revoked. >> >> You would add a viral clause which makes sure that further refinements >> of the tool are also covered by the same dual condition (GPL + Xilinx only). > >But what if someone figures out XDL by reverse engineering your tool, >rather than Xilinx's software? How do you prohibit someone from >reverse engineering (ie, reading and taking notes) open code? The viral clause must still apply to the reverse engineered tool; it has to define reverse engineering as a form of "use". - Brian
From: Kolja Sulimma on 31 Jan 2006 08:45 Ed McGettigan schrieb: > The (A) company used these exact same EULA restrictions against Clear Logic > and won. > > More details here: > http://www.internetcases.com/archives/2005/09/ninth_circuit_a_1.html There is no mentioning of the EULA. Apparently there is a special law in the US to protect semiconductor masks and the court treated the bitstream as a mask work. The EULA can still be completely invalid. I just skimmed the law, and I still do not see how Altera could possibly have won. It says "the ?owner? of a mask work is the person who created the mask work" If I start bitgen, I am generating the mask work and not altera. I use a tool to do it, yes, but surely I am still the creator? But even if Altera was the owner, it goes on: "the protection provided for a mask work under this chapter shall commence on the date on which the mask work is registered under section 908, or the date on which the mask work is first commercially exploited anywhere in the world" Surely Altera did not register my bitstream and did not exploit it comercially before I sent it to Clear Logic? Then the law goes on, and explicitely allows to reverse engineer the mask (bitstream) to create your own bitstreams with the information obtained: ?906 (a) 1 and 2: "it is not an infringement [...] for [...] a person who performs the analysis or evaluation described in paragraph (1) to incorporate the results of such conduct in an original mask work which is made to be distributed." I conclude that ?906 (a) of the Semiconductor Chip Protection Act of 1994 permits to reverse engineer bitstream information to create open source tools. But hey, IANAL. Kolja Sulimma
From: cs_posting on 31 Jan 2006 09:01 Kolja Sulimma wrote: > Sorry Austin, that is complete nonsense. Xilinx can not own a file that > contains IP both from me an third parties. > A shared ownership might be possible but I really doubt that. That seems to be the most logical basis for a claim. Compare for example, this partial passage from RedHat's default licensing of the Cygwin compatability layer: "The Cygwin API library found in the winsup subdirectory of the source code is also covered by the GNU GPL (with exceptions; see below). By default, all executables link against this library (and in the process include GPL'd Cygwin glue code). This means that unless you modify the tools so that compiled executables do not make use of the Cygwin library, your compiled programs will also have to be free software distributed under the GPL with source code available to all." This seems to say that if you compile in a way that includes bits of their library, RedHat has an ownership interest in your binary. The only difference is that they exercise that interest by extending the GPL to the result, whereas Xilinx exercises its interest by extending its restrictions on keeping the technology proprietary and only running it on Xilinx silicon. RedHat is also willing to sell you a license to use the parts of the Cygwin stuff which they own under non-GPL terms, and Xilinx may be willing to license a bit stream to you slightly differently if you can make a convincing argument to why it would be in their interest to do so.
From: Kolja Sulimma on 31 Jan 2006 09:18
cs_posting(a)hotmail.com schrieb: > Kolja Sulimma wrote: > > >>Sorry Austin, that is complete nonsense. Xilinx can not own a file that >>contains IP both from me an third parties. >>A shared ownership might be possible but I really doubt that. > > This seems to say that if you compile in a way that includes bits of > their library, RedHat has an ownership interest in your binary. The > only difference is that they exercise that interest by extending the > GPL to the result, whereas Xilinx exercises its interest by extending > its restrictions on keeping the technology proprietary and only running > it on Xilinx silicon. RedHat is also willing to sell you a license to > use the parts of the Cygwin stuff which they own under non-GPL terms, > and Xilinx may be willing to license a bit stream to you slightly > differently if you can make a convincing argument to why it would be in > their interest to do so. That would be shared ownership, which is possible. But to claim that, Xilinx must argue that the bitstream contains material that is protected by copyright. Is is not enough that it was created with a tool that is protected by copyright. (Using a compiler/text editor vs. linking to a library/using a letter template) Some bitstreams might contain Xilinx library elements but clearly not all bitstreams do. Kolja Sulimma BTW: The ISE toolflow uses TCL at some points. If the use of a tool alone would impose the license of the tool on the result all bitstreams would be GPL. So Xilinx needs to explain why the EULA of ISE does affect the bitstream while the license of TCL does not. |