License violation

[DerekTurtleRoe]

Did you guys give permission to SNK/Tommo to use OpenDingux in a commercial product? That includes re-licensing.

They are using OpenDingux on the NEO GEO X system. I assume without your permission, and they have provided no source code at all.

[mthuurne]

We have not had any kind of contact with them.

Note that OpenDingux is a collection of many different packages, the vast majority of which are not owned by Paul, me or other OpenDingux contributors. So it is not possible to license OpenDIngux as a whole: anyone using packages from OpenDingux should comply with the license of each individual package that is used.

Some of the packages in OpenDingux are licensed under GPL, which requires source code to be provided on request. If I recall correctly, whoever provided the binary should also provide the source, when asked. If they don't, they would be violating copyrights on the GPL-licensed package.

Talking about the Linux kernel specifically, from early videos of the Neo Geo X it seems they are not using the OpenDingux kernel for JZ4770, since they have HDMI out but do not have vsync, which is the opposite of the situation on the GCW Zero. Not that it matters from a licensing point of view: the Linux kernel is licensed under GPL, so they should provide source code regardless of whether their kernel is based on the OpenDingux kernel or not.

In any case, it is not clear to me whether they used any OpenDingux-specific code or whether they only used pre-existing open source packages that are also used in OpenDingux.

[DerekTurtleRoe]

All of the emulators and applications you can run have the .dge extension. Also, running basic system info commands spits out info about OpenDingux. When running SSH from a PC, it says "Welcome to OpenDingux".

They also use Final Burn Alpha code, which is released under a MAME license. That license even states that it can't be used for anything involving commercial profit.

They also made changes, because the version number is custom. They probably just removed anything they didn't need and added some NEO GEO X specific stuff. I know they changed the emulator, because they fixed the bugs in a "firmware" update.