Xorg copyright infrigement

[Egbert Eich]

On Sun, Apr 27, 2014 at 12:28:46PM +0200, Mateusz Jończyk wrote:
> > 
> > The xls however, felt as if it was meant as a reference implementation, aimed at
> > improving the proliferation of CVT. If graham does get contacted, i think he
> > would agree.
> I don't have any doubts that the Authors of the XLS would agree to inclusion of its
> derivative works in XOrg and other programs.
> Until that happens, however, we cannot rely on it.
> > 
> > Now, before we do get access to those documents, how are you intending to
> > circumvent this claimed copyright infringement without infringing yourself under
> > your very strict rules?
> We could just rewrite it using the Chinese wall principle:
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_room_design

Gentlemen - please get out of this rat hole!

The implemenation in the X.Org repo - from which other implemenations 
were derived - is not a copy of the code in the spread sheet and
therefore does not infringe on any copyright held by the author of it: 
the spread sheet is in XLS, the X.Org implemenation is C code:
The *only* thing in common with the spread sheet is the *algorithm*.

This algorithm however is a published and publically available VESA 
standard.

One can obtain VESA standards either
- by downloading them if they are available for free download (some are) 
- by purchasing them
- by being a member of VESA.

The beauty of VESA standards is that they are royalty free: Once one 
has obtained one one can freely implement it.
In our case here, the algorithm if the CVT standard was published by 
VESA and made available for free download thru the said spread sheet 
(instead of a pdf document).

So why on earth would anybody now want to do a clean room implemenation 
of a standard that is publically available?

The *only* thing that should be done is to get rid of the paragraph 
containing the eye-brow raiser term 'stolen' to something saying:

    This code is an implemenation of the VESA CVT standard.
    This standard can be obtained from http://www.vesa.org.

Cheers,
	Egbert.