[vtk-developers] vtkPatented copyright...

[Goodwin Lawlor]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Brad King" <brad.king at kitware.com>
To: "Goodwin Lawlor" <goodwin.lawlor at ucd.ie>
Cc: <vtk-developers at vtk.org>
Sent: Tuesday, February 01, 2005 2:14 PM
Subject: Re: [vtk-developers] vtkPatented copyright...


> Goodwin Lawlor wrote:
> > I was going to leave vtkPatented out of vtkit but Steve Pieper made a
> > suggestion that may work:
> > vtkit has vtkPatented statically linked (but not automatically loaded
into
> > the interpreter) but a tcl script must use "package require vtkpatented"
in
> > order to load and use the patented classes.
> >
> > The "package require vtkpatented" call could also print out a
> > copyright/patented notice to the console or popup a warning message box
that
> > the user must accept to continue. Also a warning on the vtkit download
page
> > could be put up.
> >
> > This would make the user explicitly aware that the classes in
vtkPatented
> > can not be used for commercial applications without a license.
> >
> > Would this be acceptable?
>
> Probably, but again I'm not a lawyer nor have I seen the official
> agreements related to this.
>
> > Should all tcl examples/tests require a "package require vtkpatented"
when
> > using patented classes?
>
> We plan to phase out vtkPatented completely in 5.0 to avoid these
> issues.  The Marching Cubes patent expires in June 2005 anyway.

Does that mean these will get removed from VTK altogether?

vtkDecimate was filed by GE in 1995
vtkSweptSurface was filed by GE in 1994
SynchronizedTemplates - Kitware patent pending

cf http://public.kitware.com/pipermail/vtk-developers/2002-July/001757.html

Thanks,

Goodwin



> -Brad
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