OPENCORES.ORG

From: nathael.pajani+opencores at free.fropencores@f...>
Date: Wed Oct 3 19:44:56 CEST 2007
Subject: [oc] patents and logic cores

Hi all ! When someone owns a patent on something, his only right is to prevent you from selling or making commercial use of what is protected by the patent, in the countries where the patent applies. This mean you can use it for personal investigation, learning, publish derived work for free on the internet (the patent itself is already considered a publication) You can also provide source HDL code that implements the patent protected stuff on the internet, even in the country where the national patent has been issued. But you cannot sell anything that uses the patent or any derived work that's covered by the patent in a country where the patent applies. Then when you look at this: http://www.opencores.org/projects.cgi/web/nnARM/overview you can feel like you're infringing the patent. You shouldn't. As long as you do no commercial use of the patent protected stuff. Keep in mind that when you buy an IP from the IP owner, you do not buy the HDL code in itself, but the right to sell products with the IP included. You buy the right to make commercial use of the patented stuff. So If you do publish your HDL on the opencore.org site it will be legal, others will have the right to implement it in FPGA for themselves, but no one will have the right to sell anything made using this HDL code. >From what I remember of my courses about patents some years ago, that's it. Then, for US patents in the USA... I do not know if you can or cannot implement the HDL in an FPGA for yourself if the HDL is patented. But who would know ? One last thing: A patent gives the patent owner the right to prevent you from selling (or distributing hardware for free, which is still commercial use) patented work, but they or not bound to do it. They can leave this right unused. It would be so much better for the whole world. Have fun. Hope I'm right and this will be usefull. +++ ----- Original Message ----- From: tkafafi at hotmail.com<tkafafi@h...> To: Date: Mon Oct 1 04:49:04 CEST 2007 Subject: [oc] patents and logic cores > Hi Guenter, > I don't know the answer to the legal technicalities you are asking, > but I > would recommend you stay away from pattent protected stuff. Any > lawsuit will bring you lots of headaches and financial harm even if > your > action is not necesarily illegal. > Thanks > ----- Original Message ----- > From: Günter Dannoritzer<dannoritzer at w...> > To: > Date: Sat Sep 29 14:54:38 CEST 2007 > Subject: [oc] patents and logic cores > > Hi, > > > > I have been searching in the mailing list archives for patents > and > > how > > they apply to logic cores. John Dalton did some interesting > > comparison > > back in 2003 about the meaning of patents in the US and > Australia. > > What I am looking for, and did not find an answer in the > archive > > is, how > > do patents apply to the development of logic cores? Let's say > I > > implement an algorithm as explained and claimed by a national > > patent. Is > > the design of that algorithm in HDL a patent infringement or > is the > > implementation of the HDL on a FPGA or ASIC the patent > > infringement? > > Now to the national issue. I guess an infringement only > applies to > > a > > country where the patent is issued from. So in case of a > national > > patent, if that patent has not been issued in any other > country, I > > would > > be able to implement the algorithm and use it in all other > > countries, > > except for the one country the patent has been issued from, > without > > causing an infringement? > > How does that apply to opencores now? As the server is placed > in > > one > > country would it be possible to implement algorithms and post > them > > on > > opencores that are protected by a national patent, not issued > in > > the > > country the server is placed at? > > I guess due to the mirror server that exist it would require > to > > consider > > patents issued in each country a mirror server is placed? > > Thanks for anyone shedding some light on this topic. > > Cheers, > > Guenter > > > > > >