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2
3
4<h3>The GPL BusyBox license</h3>
5
6There has been some confusion in the past as to exactly what is
7required to safely distribute GPL'd software such as BusyBox as
8part of a product. To ensure that there is no confusion
9whatsoever, this page attempts to summarize what you should do to
10ensure you do not accidentally violate the law.
11
12<p>
13<h3>Complying with the BusyBox license is easy and completely free.</h3>
14
15U.S. and International Law protects copyright owners from the unauthorized
16reproduction, adaptation, display, distribution, etc of copyright protected
17works. Copyright violations (such as shipping BusyBox in a manner contrary to
18its license) are subject to severe penalties. The courts can award up to
19$150,000 per product shipped without even showing any actual loss by the
20copyright holder. Criminal penalties are available for intentional acts
21undertaken for purposes of "commercial advantage" or "private financial gain."
22In addition, if it comes to my attention that you are violating the BusyBox
23license, I will list you on the <a href="/shame.html">BusyBox Hall of Shame</a>
24webpage.
25
26<p>
27
28Nobody wants that to happen. Do everyone a favor and don't break the law -- if
29you use BusyBox, you <b>must comply with the BusyBox license</b>.
30
31<p>
32<h3>BusyBox is licensed under the GNU General Public License</h3>
33
34BusyBox is licensed under the GNU General Public License , which
35is generally just abbreviated as the GPL license, or
36just the GPL.
37<p>
38<a href="/products.html">Anyone thinking of shipping
39BusyBox as part of a product</a> should be familiar with the
40licensing terms under which they are allowed to use and
41distribute BusyBox. You are advised to take a look over the
42
43<ul>
44<li><a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html">full text of
45the GNU General Public License</a>, and
46<li><a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html">
47Frequently Asked Questions about the GNU GPL</a>
48</ul>
49to be sure you (and your lawyers) fully understand them.
50
51<p>
52
53The following is a quick summary for the impatient. If you
54carefully follow these steps, it will ensure that you are 100%
55authorized to ship BusyBox with your product, and have no reason
56to worry about lawsuits or being listed on the <a
57href="/shame.html">BusyBox Hall of Shame</a> page. You will be
58able to sleep peacefully at night knowing you have fulfilled all
59your licensing obligations.
60
61<p>
62
63If you distribute a product, it should either be accompanied by
64<b>full source for all GPL'd products</b> (including BusyBox)
65and/or a <b>written offer</b> to supply the source for all
66GPL'd products for the cost of shipping and handling. The source
67has to be in its preferred machine readable form, so you cannot
68encrypt or obfuscate it. You are not required to provide full
69source for all the closed source applications that happen to be
70part of the system with BusyBox, though you can certainly do so
71if you feel like it. But providing source for the GPL licensed
72applications such as BusyBox is mandatory.
73
74<p>
75
76<b>Accompanied by source</b> generally means you distribute the full
77source code for all GPL'd products including BusyBox along with your
78product, such as by placing it somewhere on a driver CD. Full source
79code includes the BusyBox ".config" file used when your shipping BusyBox
80binary was compiled, and any and all modifications you made to the
81BusyBox source code.
82
83<p>
84
85<b>A written offer</b> generally means that somewhere in the
86documentation for your product, you write something like
87
88<blockquote>
89The GPL source code contained in this product is available as a
90free download from http://blah.blah.blah/
91</blockquote>
92Alternatively, you can offer the source code by writing
93somewhere in the documentation for your product something like
94<blockquote>
95If you would like a copy of the GPL source code contained in this
96product shipped to you on CD, please send $9.99 to &lt;address&gt;
97which covers the cost of preparing and mailing a CD to you.
98</blockquote>
99<p>
100
101Keep in mind though that if you distribute GPL'd binaries online (as is often
102done when supplying firmware updates), it is <b>highly</b> recommended that you
103make the corresponding source available online at the same place. Regardless,
104if you distribute a binary copy of BusyBox online (such as part of a firmware
105update) you <b>must</b> either make source available online (i.e.
106<b>accompanied by source</b>) and/or inform those downloading firmware updates
107of their right to obtain source (i.e. <b>a written offer</b>). Failure to do
108so is a violation of your licensing obligations.
109
110
111<p>
112
113Some people have the mistaken understanding that if they use unmodified
114GPL'd source code, they do not need to distribute anything. This belief
115is not correct, and is not supported by the
116<a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html">text of GPL</a>.
117Please do re-read it -- you will find there is no such provision.
118If you distribute any GPL'd binaries, you must also make source available
119as discussed on this webpage.
120
121<p>
122<h3>A Good Example</h3>
123
124These days, <a href="http://www.linksys.com/">Linksys</a> is
125doing a good job at complying with the GPL, they get to be an
126example of how to do things right. Please take a moment and
127check out what they do with
128<a href="http://www.linksys.com/download/firmware.asp?fwid=178">
129distributing the firmware for their WRT54G Router.</a>
130Following their example would be a fine way to ensure that you
131have also fulfilled your licensing obligations.
132
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