T&C for licensing smoothie

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Selim A

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May 10, 2022, 11:42:09 AM5/10/22
to Smoothie-Dev
Hello,

Can anybody let me know if this software is free to be fully customised and then licensed under the name of a Company with a different name? I see that it is open sourced, but I don't see any disclaimer about proprietorship and licensing...  

Can anybody guides me?

Thank you,
Selim

Arthur Wolf

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May 10, 2022, 1:24:40 PM5/10/22
to Selim A, Smoothie-Dev
https://github.com/Smoothieware/Smoothieboard on the hardware (license is CERN OHL v1.2)

In short, you need to publish under the same license, and credit the original project.

Can you tell us more about what you are trying to do?



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Selim Aydin

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May 11, 2022, 8:16:52 PM5/11/22
to Arthur Wolf, Smoothie-Dev

Hi Arthur,

 

Thank you for you reply.

 

I am the Director of ANC Business Solutions Ltd, registered in the UK. We do web development and bespoke web/desktop/mobile applications. One of our clients -can not disclose their names for now, is looking for a CNC software that will be ultimately licensed as their commercial product. They are producing laser cutting machines. Currently they deliver what is supplied by their control panel (hardware) producers; but would like to offer their own software which will also have some additional features like image processing before sending to machine.

We have 2 options, either we will build sting from scratch; or, we will use an open-source solution as a base and customize it as per our client’s needs, then license it, if possible.

Smoothieware looks like an option, although we have not seen the GUI yet; and they would be happy to credit you if used.  However, they strictly want to have their interface closed off and proprietary.

Do you think this could be achieved with your soft?

AS far as we know; Lightburn are using your platform (it runs on smoothie hardware) and that is a licenced commercial product.

Kindly let me know what would be your approach to this...

 

Kind Regards,

 

Selim Aydin

Director

ANC Business Solutions Ltd

Selim Aydin

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May 16, 2022, 6:10:46 AM5/16/22
to Arthur Wolf, Smoothie-Dev

Hi there,

 

May I know your thoughts please? We are considering alternatives, so I need to understand your approach before all.

If sthing is not clear, kindly let me know...

 

Kind Regards,

 

Selim Aydin

Director

ANC Business Solutions Ltd

 

Wolfmanjm

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May 16, 2022, 9:13:16 AM5/16/22
to Smoothie-Dev
Arthur Wolf is the definitive source, however I'll point out that smoothieware is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0, so as I understand this means anything you may do to it also has to be released under the same license and all source needs to be made available. You cannot just use the code in a commercial closed source product. (although you may be able to license it from Arthur).

Lightburn is a frontend user interface and does not use smoothieware in their product. They do however have a modified version of smoothieware, which is open sourced as per the license and the modified source code is available.

The only GUI frontend specifically for Smoothie is my program Smoopi, and I certainly would not allow this to be used in a commercial product, unless all the source code is released, and you get permission from me.

If you want a closed source firmware you will need to write your own or get a commercial license for one of the open sourced ones.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Arthur Wolf

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May 16, 2022, 10:13:23 AM5/16/22
to Selim Aydin, Smoothie-Dev
On Thu, May 12, 2022 at 2:16 AM Selim Aydin <seaand...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Arthur,

 

Thank you for you reply.

 

I am the Director of ANC Business Solutions Ltd, registered in the UK. We do web development and bespoke web/desktop/mobile applications. One of our clients -can not disclose their names for now, is looking for a CNC software that will be ultimately licensed as their commercial product.


Are you talking about the Smoothieware firmware that runs on Smoothieboard (and compatible boards)?
Or about something else.

If you are, that firmware can be used in commercial products, as long as any modifications to the source code are released publicly under the same license (this is the basis of Free Software, you can read the GPL or look at the Wikipedia article on Open-Source/Free software).

Do they need to keep their modifications to the source code secret?

They are producing laser cutting machines. Currently they deliver what is supplied by their control panel (hardware) producers; but would like to offer their own software which will also have some additional features like image processing before sending to machine.


Panel software (Smoopi, Visicut, Lightburn) and controller software (Smoothieware), are two completely separate things (panel software takes user input, and uses an interface to "tell" the controller what to do with the motors).
Which of the two are you actually discussing here?

We have 2 options, either we will build sting from scratch; or, we will use an open-source solution as a base and customize it as per our client’s needs, then license it, if possible.


Making something from scratch would be quite the adventure...

If you want to use an Open-Source solution, the basic pricinple of Open-Source is that the license must be preserved (any modifications are released under the same open-source license).

Sometimes Open-Source project allow close-source derivatives under a separate license, for pay. That's not something we've ever considered, though I supposed if there was enough monetary or coder-time incentive (to help further develop the project), that's something that might be considered. If that's what you are looking to do here, maybe contact me privately, we'll discuss what you need, and I'll discuss it with the rest of the team.

Smoothieware looks like an option, although we have not seen the GUI yet;


The GUI is separate from the controller project, Smoothie is compatible with dozens of GUIs, Smoopi is the one that is closest to the project (developped by Jim, who is also lead on the controller).
 

and they would be happy to credit you if used.  However, they strictly want to have their interface closed off and proprietary.

Do you think this could be achieved with your soft?

No. If the goal is to have something closed, you don't want to be basing it off something open-source... that's a pretty basic contradiction...
There are exceptions as mentionned above, so contact me directly if that's the road you are actually looking at.

Do they really need it to be closed?

It's 2022, plenty of companies base their work on open-source work (saving massive amounts of work/money), and release it as open-source in return (which the license requires).

AS far as we know; Lightburn are using your platform (it runs on smoothie hardware) and that is a licenced commercial product.


Lightburn "talks" to our platform. It's a GUI, we are a controller system. It's like Lightburn is Microsoft Word, and Smoothie is your printer.


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