[IAEP] GPL non-compliance, was Re: [SLOBS] GPLv3

[Bernie Innocenti]

On Wed, 2011-04-20 at 21:05 -0400, Walter Bender wrote: 
> > BTW, and regarding that, what's the point of having a license if such clear
> > violation just go like that forever?  we all know that the desire that kids
> > would do stuff with source just hasn't happened so much (I agree with Martin
> > there), but nevertheless it is common knowledge that I have not been the
> > only one that has been given the "oso" by Ceibal... And requests from real
> > potential developers are apparently not going anywhere, to the point that
> > Walter had to take a liberated XO to a UY kid for that purpose.
> 
> Again, this was not in respect to Sugar. Also, last time I was .uy, I
> was told that full access to the machine was part of the Ceibal
> upgrade plan. I have not seen evidence one way or another to suggest
> that this is not still the plan.

I can confirm this, I've worked on this new software release with the
Sugar developers at LATU  when I was in Montevideo.

The new OS is based on Dextrose 1 (Fedora 11 + Sugar 0.88) and comes
with a refactored anti-theft system which works from the initramfs, much
like the OLPC one. This allows Uruguay to give root access to children
without compromising the security system.

I don't know whether a developer key is required and other details. If
the children have root access, they can easily replace any system
software, including Sugar. This would satisfy the requirements of the
GPLv3.

BTW, Fedora 11 already includes plenty of GPLv3 software. To find out,
open the Terminal and type:

rpm -qa --queryformat '%{name} %{license}\n' | grep GPLv3

The copyright owners of any of the listed packages could choose to
enforce the anti-DRM clause on infringing distributors.

-- 
Bernie Innocenti
Sugar Labs Infrastructure Team
http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Infrastructure_Team