Re: legal issues REALTEK 8169 driver

[Stephen Hemminger]

On Thu, 11 Sep 2008 09:50:35 +0200
Johan Visser <johan.visser@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi,
> We are using a new SBC with 2 REALTEK 8169 chips on it.
> We tried the latest kernel drivers, but ran into problems.
> In average 1 out of 5 times that the system boots, the network won't 
> come alive.
> We think it is an initialisation problem.
> 
> We looked further on the net, and stumbled upon the Linux driver ( 
> source code! ) on the REALTEK site.
> http://www.realtek.com.tw/downloads/downloadsView.aspx?Langid=1&PNid=13&PFid=5&Level=5&Conn=4&DownTypeID=3&GetDown=false
> We tried it, and it solves the problem.
> We also noted that an earlier version of this driver was merged into the 
> linux kernel. ( 8.001 or so )
> 
> Now the legal issue.
> in the REALTEK documentation (release_note.txt )is says :
> 
> driver version: 8.008.00
> Modify the GPHY parameters for RTL8111C
> release date: 2008/07/14
> <snip>
> 7. This product is covered by one or more of the following patents:
>    US5,307,459, US5,434,872, US5,732,094, US6,570,884, US6,115,776, and 
> US6,327,625.
> 
> But the code is GPL... as stated in the source.
> 
> Can we use this code in a commercial product without problems ?

That is a question for your legal staff. Have them read:
 
http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/info/GPLv2.html

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