[xmlroff] license question (nuclear facility clause)

[Tony Graham]

On Sun, Dec 23 2007 15:15:32 +0000, debacle at debian.org wrote:
> there was a discussion on this list in 2006-02, but what was the
> result? The file "COPYING" closes with the following statement:
>
> "You acknowledge that this Software is not designed, licensed or
> intended for use in the design, construction, operation or maintenance
> of any nuclear facility."
>
> Does this mean, that the copyright holder does not allow to use
> xmlroff in nuclear facilities? Or do they just not want to be
> held responsible, if the use of xmlroff will lead to a
> Chernobyl-like desaster? In the first case, this would make
> xmlroff non-free in the sense of both DFSG[1] and OSD[2].

Thanks to the efforts of Jon Bosak of Sun and of Mike Anastasio of Sun's
Intellectual Property Law Group, Sun has approved the re-release of
xmlroff under the following BSD license (essentially the same as the old
one with the nuclear paragraph removed):

/=================================================================
| Copyright (c) 2001, 2002 Sun Microsystems. All Rights Reserved.
| 
| Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
| modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are
| met:
| 
|  - Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
|    notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer.
| 
|  - Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
|    notice, this list of conditions, and the following disclaimer in the
|    documentation and/or other materials provided with the
|    distribution.
| 
|  - Neither the name of Sun Microsystems nor the names of
|    contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived
|    from this software without specific prior written permission.
| 
| This software is provided "AS IS," without a warranty of any
| kind. ALL EXPRESS OR IMPLIED CONDITIONS, REPRESENTATIONS, AND
| WARRANTIES, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF MERCHANTABILITY,
| FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE, OR NON INFRINGEMENT, ARE HEREBY
| EXCLUDED. SUN MICROSYSTEMS AND ITS LICENSORS SHALL NOT BE LIABLE
| FOR ANY DAMAGES SUFFERED BY LICENSEE AS A RESULT OF USING,
| MODIFYING, OR DISTRIBUTING THE SOFTWARE OR ITS DERIVATIVES. IN NO
| EVENT SHALL SUN MICROSYSTEMS OR ITS LICENSORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY
| LOST REVENUE, PROFIT, OR DATA, OR FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL,
| CONSEQUENTIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR PUNITIVE DAMAGES, HOWEVER CAUSED AND
| REGARDLESS OF THE THEORY OF LIABILITY, ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF
| OR INABILITY TO USE THE SOFTWARE, EVEN IF SUN MICROSYSTEMS HAS
| BEEN ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES.
\=================================================================


Changes made since Sun released the original source code and ceased its
involvement with the project will be similarly relicensed, so the next
xmlroff release, due on or about 1st April, will be able to use the new
license.

Regards,


Tony.