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Documentation: Add a file explaining the Linux kernel license enforcement policy
This adds a short document describing the views of how the Linux kernel community feels about enforcing the license of the kernel. Acked-by: Al Viro <[email protected]> Acked-by: Alex Elder (Linaro) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Andrea Arcangeli <[email protected]> Acked-by: Andy Gross <[email protected]> Acked-by: Aneesh Kumar K.V <[email protected]> Acked-by: Anna Schumaker <[email protected]> Acked-by: Ard Biesheuvel <[email protected]> Acked-by: Arnd Bergmann <[email protected]> Acked-by: Arvind Yadav <[email protected]> Acked-by: Bart Van Assche <[email protected]> Acked-by: Bhumika Goyal <[email protected]> Acked-by: Bjorn Andersson <[email protected]> Acked-by: Borislav Petkov <[email protected]> Acked-by: Christian Borntraeger <[email protected]> Acked-by: Christian König <[email protected]> Acked-by: Christophe JAILLET <[email protected]> Acked-by: Chuck Lever <[email protected]> Acked-by: Colin Ian King <[email protected]> Acked-by: Daniel Borkmann <[email protected]> Acked-by: Daniel Lezcano <[email protected]> Acked-by: Daniel Vetter <[email protected]> Acked-by: Darrick J. Wong (Oracle) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Darrick J. Wong <[email protected]> Acked-by: David Kershner <[email protected]> Acked-by: David S. Miller <[email protected]> Acked-by: Dmitry Torokhov <[email protected]> Acked-by: Doug Ledford <[email protected]> Acked-by: Fabio Estevam <[email protected]> Acked-by: Felipe Balbi <[email protected]> Acked-by: Florian Westphal <[email protected]> Acked-by: Geert Uytterhoeven <[email protected]> Acked-by: Guenter Roeck <[email protected]> Acked-by: Hannes Reinecke <[email protected]> Acked-by: Hans de Goede <[email protected]> Acked-by: Heiko Carstens <[email protected]> Acked-by: Heiko Stuebner <[email protected]> Acked-by: Heiner Kallweit <[email protected]> Acked-by: Ingo Molnar <[email protected]> Acked-by: Ivan Safonov <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jaegeuk Kim <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jan Kara (SUSE) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Javier Martinez Canillas <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jeff Kirsher <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jens Axboe <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jes Sorensen <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jiri Kosina <[email protected]> Acked-by: Jiri Pirko <[email protected]> Acked-by: Joe Perches <[email protected]> Acked-by: Joerg Roedel (SUSE) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Johan Hovold <[email protected]> Acked-by: Josh Poimboeuf <[email protected]> Acked-by: Juergen Gross <[email protected]> Acked-by: Julia Lawall <[email protected]> Acked-by: K. Y. Srinivasan <[email protected]> Acked-by: Khalid Aziz <[email protected]> Acked-by: Krzysztof Kozlowski <[email protected]> Acked-by: Kuninori Morimoto <[email protected]> Acked-by: Larry Finger <[email protected]> Acked-by: Laura Abbott <[email protected]> Acked-by: Lee Jones <[email protected]> Acked-by: Leon Romanovsky <[email protected]> Acked-by: Linus Walleij (Linaro) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Lv Zheng <[email protected]> Acked-by: Martin K. Petersen (Oracle) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Masahiro Yamada <[email protected]> Acked-by: Masami Hiramatsu <[email protected]> Acked-by: Mel Gorman <[email protected]> Acked-by: Michael S. Tsirkin <[email protected]> Acked-by: Michal Hocko <[email protected]> Acked-by: Mike Marshall <[email protected]> Acked-by: Namhyung Kim <[email protected]> Acked-by: Neil Armstrong <[email protected]> Acked-by: Olof Johansson <[email protected]> Acked-by: Pablo Neira Ayuso <[email protected]> Acked-by: Paolo Bonzini <[email protected]> Acked-by: Paul Burton <[email protected]> Acked-by: Paul E. McKenney <[email protected]> Acked-by: Peter Zijlstra <[email protected]> Acked-by: Rafael J. Wysocki <[email protected]> Acked-by: Ralf Baechle <[email protected]> Acked-by: Richard Weinberger <[email protected]> Acked-by: Rik van Riel <[email protected]> Acked-by: Rob Clark <[email protected]> Acked-by: Rob Herring <[email protected]> Acked-by: Sebastian Reichel (Collabora) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Shawn Guo <[email protected]> Acked-by: Shuah Khan <[email protected]> Acked-by: Simon Horman <[email protected]> Acked-by: Srinivas Kandagatla <[email protected]> Acked-by: Steven Rostedt (VMware) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Sven Eckelmann <[email protected]> Acked-by: Takashi Iwai (SUSE) <[email protected]> Acked-by: Tejun Heo <[email protected]> Acked-by: Thierry Reding <[email protected]> Acked-by: Tony Luck <[email protected]> Acked-by: Ulf Hansson <[email protected]> Acked-by: Vinod Koul <[email protected]> Acked-by: Viresh Kumar <[email protected]> Acked-by: Vivien Didelot <[email protected]> Acked-by: Wei Yongjun <[email protected]> Acked-by: Xin Long <[email protected]> Signed-off-by: Greg Kroah-Hartman <[email protected]>
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Documentation/process/index.rst

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@@ -25,6 +25,7 @@ Below are the essential guides that every developer should read.
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submitting-patches
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coding-style
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email-clients
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kernel-enforcement-statement
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Other guides to the community that are of interest to most developers are:
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Linux Kernel Enforcement Statement
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As developers of the Linux kernel, we have a keen interest in how our software
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is used and how the license for our software is enforced. Compliance with the
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reciprocal sharing obligations of GPL-2.0 is critical to the long-term
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sustainability of our software and community.
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Although there is a right to enforce the separate copyright interests in the
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contributions made to our community, we share an interest in ensuring that
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individual enforcement actions are conducted in a manner that benefits our
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community and do not have an unintended negative impact on the health and
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growth of our software ecosystem. In order to deter unhelpful enforcement
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actions, we agree that it is in the best interests of our development
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community to undertake the following commitment to users of the Linux kernel
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on behalf of ourselves and any successors to our copyright interests:
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Notwithstanding the termination provisions of the GPL-2.0, we agree that
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it is in the best interests of our development community to adopt the
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following provisions of GPL-3.0 as additional permissions under our
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license with respect to any non-defensive assertion of rights under the
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license.
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However, if you cease all violation of this License, then your license
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from a particular copyright holder is reinstated (a) provisionally,
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unless and until the copyright holder explicitly and finally
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terminates your license, and (b) permanently, if the copyright holder
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fails to notify you of the violation by some reasonable means prior to
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60 days after the cessation.
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Moreover, your license from a particular copyright holder is
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reinstated permanently if the copyright holder notifies you of the
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violation by some reasonable means, this is the first time you have
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received notice of violation of this License (for any work) from that
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copyright holder, and you cure the violation prior to 30 days after
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your receipt of the notice.
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Our intent in providing these assurances is to encourage more use of the
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software. We want companies and individuals to use, modify and distribute
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this software. We want to work with users in an open and transparent way to
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eliminate any uncertainty about our expectations regarding compliance or
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enforcement that might limit adoption of our software. We view legal action
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as a last resort, to be initiated only when other community efforts have
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failed to resolve the problem.
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Finally, once a non-compliance issue is resolved, we hope the user will feel
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welcome to join us in our efforts on this project. Working together, we will
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be stronger.
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Except where noted below, we speak only for ourselves, and not for any company
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we might work for today, have in the past, or will in the future.
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- Bjorn Andersson (Linaro)
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- Andrea Arcangeli (Red Hat)
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- Neil Armstrong
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- Jens Axboe
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- Pablo Neira Ayuso
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- Khalid Aziz
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- Ralf Baechle
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- Felipe Balbi
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- Arnd Bergmann
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- Ard Biesheuvel
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- Paolo Bonzini (Red Hat)
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- Christian Borntraeger
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- Mark Brown (Linaro)
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- Paul Burton
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- Javier Martinez Canillas
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- Rob Clark
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- Jonathan Corbet
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- Vivien Didelot (Savoir-faire Linux)
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- Hans de Goede (Red Hat)
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- Mel Gorman (SUSE)
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- Sven Eckelmann
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- Alex Elder (Linaro)
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- Fabio Estevam
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- Larry Finger
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- Bhumika Goyal
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- Andy Gross
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- Juergen Gross
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- Shawn Guo
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- Ulf Hansson
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- Tejun Heo
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- Rob Herring
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- Masami Hiramatsu
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- Michal Hocko
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- Simon Horman
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- Johan Hovold (Hovold Consulting AB)
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- Christophe JAILLET
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- Olof Johansson
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- Lee Jones (Linaro)
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- Heiner Kallweit
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- Srinivas Kandagatla
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- Jan Kara
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- Shuah Khan (Samsung)
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- David Kershner
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- Jaegeuk Kim
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- Namhyung Kim
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- Colin Ian King
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- Jeff Kirsher
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- Greg Kroah-Hartman (Linux Foundation)
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- Christian König
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- Vinod Koul
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- Krzysztof Kozlowski
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- Viresh Kumar
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- Aneesh Kumar K.V
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- Julia Lawall
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- Doug Ledford (Red Hat)
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- Chuck Lever (Oracle)
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- Daniel Lezcano
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- Shaohua Li
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- Xin Long (Red Hat)
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- Tony Luck
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- Mike Marshall
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- Chris Mason
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- Paul E. McKenney
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- David S. Miller
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- Ingo Molnar
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- Kuninori Morimoto
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- Borislav Petkov
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- Jiri Pirko
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- Josh Poimboeuf
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- Sebastian Reichel (Collabora)
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- Guenter Roeck
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- Joerg Roedel
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- Leon Romanovsky
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- Steven Rostedt (VMware)
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- Ivan Safonov
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- Ivan Safonov
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- Anna Schumaker
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- Jes Sorensen
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- K.Y. Srinivasan
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- Heiko Stuebner
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- Jiri Kosina (SUSE)
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- Dmitry Torokhov
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- Linus Torvalds
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- Thierry Reding
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- Rik van Riel
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- Geert Uytterhoeven (Glider bvba)
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- Daniel Vetter
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- Linus Walleij
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- Richard Weinberger
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- Dan Williams
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- Rafael J. Wysocki
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- Arvind Yadav
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- Masahiro Yamada
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- Wei Yongjun
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- Lv Zheng

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