Sparkling gems and new releases from the world of Free and Open Source Software
FOSSPicks
Nate explores the top FOSS, including the latest Trinity Desktop, a database for first-person shooter strategies, and an AI for building LEGO structures.
Clash of the Licenses
If you've spent any time in the retro gaming space, you'll have come across libogc – a community-developed C library that underpins a lot of GameCube and Wii emulators.
For years there have been troubling rumors that at least some of libogc's code was based on leaked information from Nintendo. The controversy's taken a new turn recently, as it seems that significant portions of libogc have also been copied from other open source projects: most notably the Real-Time Executive for Multiprocessor Systems (RTEMS) and the Linux kernel, without proper attribution.
RTEMS is released under a permissive 2-clause BSD license, meaning its code can be reused provided the original authors are credited. RTEMS has released a statement claiming that this hasn't been done. It also points out that the Linux kernel's GPLv2 license is much more restrictive.
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