Recent versions of firmware will be removed

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VK3KYY
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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by VK3KYY » Tue Apr 20, 2021 5:56 am

The repo has been updated with the commit from the last beta release.

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by VK3KYY » Tue Apr 20, 2021 9:59 pm

If anyone wants to take a copy of the firmware please do so now, as I will be deleting the public repo in 12 hours

Note.

I did try to push my changes to the upstream master repo belonging to Kai DG4KLU, who originally started this project and whose repository was technically the absolute master

However I think for for legal reasons, Kai has now has decided to delete his master repository

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EA3BIL
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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by EA3BIL » Tue Apr 20, 2021 11:54 pm

g0hww wrote:
Mon Apr 19, 2021 3:38 pm
I don't think it is fair to attack Andrew, KC7RBW, in this fashion.


I'll try to say in as less words and lines as possible...


REALLY??
Ask Andrew for the current thoughts about the "so desired" code.

I don't want to be really rude using "wrong" words, anyway I'll say only ONE phrase about his behave:

Now show your face to all users and tell them about this project is no longer to exist because the criminal attach made to it.

English is NOT my main language and I hope message is clear enought:

Hi better lose himself in a nowhere forest.
Anda y que se pierda en un bosque.

....Irony mode ON....
Well done man, well done.
............................................

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DU2XXR
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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by DU2XXR » Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:36 am

I love openGD77 and how it has changed the paradigm for DMR for many radio amateurs. I made a few contributions but not technical--mostly just in the documentation, which needed some improvements at some point in late 2019--so just minimal.

However, I also realize that as a community we must respect intellectual property and licensing. It's not only about legalese, but respect for the efforts and intentions of contributors and those whose work the product is built upon. I don't think we should point our anger toward certain persons who are pointing out certain issues. Maybe that will result in the community addressing the issue at the source (pun?) and thus continuing with a good product while at the same time getting into compliance.

I can only surmise that the devs' intentions are good, but perhaps at some point, complications in the licensing (e.g., open source, with the addition of commercial blob) put the community and product in a grey area.

(BTW, the "commercialization" of the firmware should not be an issue, as GPL does not preclude inclusion into commercial products for as long as the source is provided/available and that derivatives of the product are allowed even with commercial distribution. Profitable companies have been built upon what is essentially free and open source software--particularly earning from support.)

If workarounds or reworks are needed, then maybe the community can move toward that as a solution.

For now, there is no question that the product is a great one and that the developers have devoted a significant amount of effort and talent into the project. The next thing that needs to be done is to determine how it can move forward if ever, or if it will get stuck in a licensing and development limbo like some other great projects out there.

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Apr 21, 2021 3:14 am

4I1RAC wrote:
Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:36 am
(BTW, the "commercialization" of the firmware should not be an issue, as GPL does not preclude inclusion into commercial products for as long as the source is provided/available and that derivatives of the product are allowed even with commercial distribution. Profitable companies have been built upon what is essentially free and open source software--particularly earning from support.)

If workarounds or reworks are needed, then maybe the community can move toward that as a solution.

For now, there is no question that the product is a great one and that the developers have devoted a significant amount of effort and talent into the project. The next thing that needs to be done is to determine how it can move forward if ever, or if it will get stuck in a licensing and development limbo like some other great projects out there.
Kai specifially wanted to prohibit commercialisation of the firmware, however it is commercialisation possible because we chose to use is the same software license as MMDVMHost.

MMDVMHost (G4KLX) also wanted to prevent commercialisation, but he didn't get the license correct, and hence his code ended up being used commcerially against his wishes.


Now this project will be sold commercially.

I'm certainly not going to work for free on this project while some companies make money by selling their "modified" version e.g. with encryption.

I have no incentive to add any new features to give away.

I doubt you will find that anyone will now spend a long time writing complex new features like SFR or SMS.

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Apr 21, 2021 3:45 am

OH.

BTW.

Re: Use of other peoples code.

I could not use the code directly from MMDVMHost becasue its written in object C++, but the firmware is written in C and does not support objects.

I had to port the code to C from C++, and kept the copyright lines out of curtacy to the original authors.
The code was generic algoritms e.g. Golay etc, not the actual hotspot functionality
There is also code from elsewhere that Kai ported for the DMR codec interface, but I thought the license was fairly relaxed as that code is from a repo where the authors wish to remain anonymous, for fear of legal action.


I'm not sure what the threshold of use of external referecnes when writing the code.

If its 1 or more lines of code, then the OpenRTX project is also subject to the license from OpenGD77, as they ported some code from the OpenGD77 project.
I can see which code they ported, as it still has the comments I wrote, even though I see they changed the names of things.

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by IU2KIN » Wed Apr 21, 2021 9:29 am

Hello Roger,

I'm speaking on behalf of the OpenRTX team.
Reading your last message we realized that we mistakenly did not give proper attribution in the code we derived from OpenGD77.
We fixed this with commit 2ff92b on our master branch, which gives proper attribution to such portions of code.

We do our best to comply with licenses and give proper credit when we benefit from other open source projects.

Regards,

Niccolò IU2KIN, and the OpenRTX team.

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by VK3KYY » Wed Apr 21, 2021 9:53 am

Niccolò

Thanks

I was trying to point out the crazy nature of cross licensing, even when taking one line of code.

Your project was the only one I could easily think of which used OpenGD77 code. I'm sure there are others.

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EA3BIL
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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by EA3BIL » Wed Apr 21, 2021 1:48 pm

da3020 wrote:
Tue Apr 20, 2021 7:00 pm
I can download latest stable release D2021.01.19.01 but how can I upload it to radio?
If hou have the .sgl file, CPS can do the update work.
Anyway this request will match better within this tread:
http://opengd77.com/viewforum.php?f=12

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Re: Recent versions of firmware will be removed

Post by KC7RBW » Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:27 pm

VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Apr 21, 2021 3:14 am
Now this project will be sold commercially.
Not by me, or by anyone I know of.
VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Apr 21, 2021 3:45 am
I had to port the code to C from C++, and kept the copyright lines out of courtesy to the original authors.
https://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.en ... nslateCode "The translation is covered by the copyright on the original program."
VK3KYY wrote:
Wed Apr 21, 2021 3:45 am
I'm not sure what the threshold of use of external references when writing the code.
It's not as much about thresholds as it is about original creative works. If you translate someone's work, it remains their work (and becomes partly yours too). If you include someone's work verbatim or partly modified they have a part in the ownership.

If you read someone else's work to learn how to do something, and then you go write your own implementation from scratch that doesn't include any of their work, based solely on what you learned, then that belongs to you. Sometimes people will do a "clean room" re-implementation to avoid any possibility of reusing the original author's work. That's where you have one person read the code and write a specification and then another person, unfamiliar with the original, reads only the specification to learn how to implement the new work.

When I tried to learn what I needed to know to implement the Golay encoding for DCS (not the same Golay encoding as DMR uses) I couldn't quite wrap my head around it well enough to actually implement the algorithm, so instead I used Hank Wallace's code, with permission, to generate the precomputed data (data is not copyrightable) and then attributed the author of that work in my writeup of the implementation.
https://hackmd.io/@ajorg/Bk5AR_8YU

Algorithms are not copyrightable, but an author's expression of an algorithm in the form of source code is.

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