Re: [PATCH 2/5] misc: mlx5ctl: Add mlx5ctl misc driver

[Greg Kroah-Hartman]

On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 01:00:14PM +0300, Leon Romanovsky wrote:
> On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 10:55:35AM +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 11:49:08AM +0300, Leon Romanovsky wrote:
> > > On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 10:30:00AM +0200, Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote:
> > > > On Wed, Oct 18, 2023 at 01:19:38AM -0700, Saeed Mahameed wrote:
> > > > > +// SPDX-License-Identifier: GPL-2.0 OR Linux-OpenIB
> > > > 
> > > > For dual-licensed code, I need a LOT of documentation as to why this
> > > > must be dual-licensed, AND a signed-off-by from your corporate lawyer
> > > > agreeing to it so they convey an understanding of just how complex and
> > > > messy this will get over time and what you are agreeing to do here.
> > > 
> > > This is how we (NBU, Networking Business Unit in Nvidia, former Mellanox)
> > > are instructed to submit all our code by default. This license is aligned
> > > with our networking, vdpa and RDMA code.
> > 
> > Please don't do this without a really really good reason.  Especially
> > for a "misc" driver that is so linux-dependant here.  
> 
> Like I said, it is our default license. Saeed will change this code to be GPL-only.
> 
> > The "Linux-OpenIB" license is old, obsolete, and problematic and should not be added to any
> > new files in the kernel tree, outside of the island of
> > drivers/infiniband/ as you all insist on that crazyness there.
> > 
> > Heck, it's even documented that you shouldn't be adding that license to
> > any new files, why ignore that?
> 
> I don't remember being asked about it, not in this patch
> https://lore.kernel.org/all/20180425203703.568152337@xxxxxxxxxxxxx/
> and not in this later patch which changed LICENSES/other/ to be
> LICENSES/deprecated/
> https://lore.kernel.org/all/20190430105130.24500-4-hch@xxxxxx/
> 
> So it is nice that someone decided to deprecate it without notifying users
> about such change. It will be better to put Linux-OpenIB to LICENSES/dual/
> folder instead.
> 
> Our lawyers are perfectly fine with Linux-OpenIB license.

Almost all others are not, sorry, you will have to convince them
otherwise, so for now, let's keep this in "deprecated" as this license
is known to have issues and should not get applied to any new code
without EXPLICIT justification why it must be so.

thanks,

greg k-h