mono and moonlight distribution method make me worried.
moonlight ms conditions not to sue
http://www.microsoft.com/interop/msnovellcollab/moonlight.mspx
http://www.microsoft.com/interop/msnovellcollab/moonlight_definitions.aspx#intermediate
"Intermediate Recipients" means resellers, recipients, and
distributors to the extent they are authorized (directly or
indirectly) by Novell or its Subsidiaries to resell, license, supply,
distribute or otherwise make available Moonlight Implementations
(whether the resale, licensing, supplying, making available, or
distribution is on a stand-alone basis, or on an OEM basis as bundled
with hardware or other software of the reseller or distributor, or
otherwise, so long as it is not bundled with a Linux operating system
other than Novell-branded operating system software), except for
resellers, recipients, or distributors who are in the business of
offering their own branded operating system software.
Notice something here Debian does not have protection. So it is the
end user downloading from Novell we need a old style wrapper .deb that
was done with java for a long time for moonlight if I am reading this
restriction right. Since that way it was not bundled with debian so
avoids the clause and was directly provide to user by Novell.
On mono there is no
http://www.microsoft.com/interop/msnovellcollab/default.mspx
protection for commercial users again unless acquired from Novell.
So I believe to follow debian requirements even that mono is open
source code it license does not provide patent protection. There are
known patent threats here so it should move to restricted for non
commercial development only. For commercial usage Novell will have
to provide.
This is going to cause upset I know pushing all the .net applications
out of mainline. My problem here is legal status. Debian has to
protect all its uses commercial and non commercial a like. Mono is
going to have to be treated like patent restricted formats. Mono
just happens to be one.
If there is some legal document proving I am wrong and debian can ship
mono and moonlight to all users without putting users at risk it would
be great to see. So far I have not found one.
Peter Dolding
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