SGI has radically simplified the license covering its OpenGL Sample Implementation, GLX, and other accelerated 2D/3D graphics software releases. Moving from five pages to three paragraphs, the new version of the SGI Free Software License B mimics the free X11 license, a non-copyleft license similar to the BSD license.

The new license was applauded by both the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and the Khronos Group, an organization developing royalty free standards around OpenGL.

The licensing affects graphics software libraries released as early as 1999, and widely integrated in Linux distributions. The libraries are typically used by gaming and scientific visualization software, such as CAD software. Affected software includes:

• SGI's OpenGL Sample Implementation
• GLX API (application programming interface)
• GLX extensions such as MESA

GLX (“OpenGL Extension to the X Window System”), in particular, is used in all major Linux distributions to “glue” the X Window System to OpenGL. As an “accelerated” graphics API, OpenGL provides a way for graphics applications to exploit graphics “acceleration” features available in modern video chipsets. That is, OpenGL aims to let graphics applications manipulate display elements directly, with minimal CPU involvement.

SGI first released GLX in 1999, under a license that mandated adherence to the OpenGL API, a requirement widely believed incompatible with X Window System licensing. Later, in a 2004 release of version 1.1 of the license, it removed the restriction, though not before getting signed agreements from the biggest OpenGL SI users not to fork the API, and to use the API's “extension” mechanism to implement additional functionality when needed.

Now, SGI has gone one better, saying essentially “do whatever you will with the code, but preserve our copyright, and do not use our name in your marketing efforts.” The full three-paragraph text of the current license — as well as earlier versions — can be found here.

SGI's move may be part of a trend toward more relaxed open source licensing terms. For example, Sun finally released Java under the GPL, after years of bickering with the open source community over more restrictive licenses aimed at ensuring that Sun would not lose control over the API. Sun and SGI (formerly Silicon Graphics) were formerly long-time rivals in the market for high-end graphics workstations.

Stated Steve Neuner, director of Linux, SGI, “This license ensures that all existing user communities will benefit, and their work can proceed unimpeded. Both Mesa and the X.org Project can continue to utilize this code in free software distributions of GNU/Linux. Now more than ever, software previously released by SGI under earlier GLX and SGI Free Software License B is free.”

Stated Peter Brown, FSF's executive director, “We couldn't be happier. This SGI code plays an important role in scientific and design applications and in the latest desktop environments and games.”

Stated Neil Trevett, president of the Khronos Group, which is partially sponsored by SGI, “Khronos applauds this move. It takes truly open standards to enable the authoring and playback of rich media on a wide variety of platforms and devices.”

Availability

More information on Version 2.0 of the SGI Free Software License B should be available here.

 
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