Making the project open source

#1

I was looking at the Blinky sample and noticed it’s labeled “Public Domain” at the top. While this is the least restrictive way to license something, it (counterintuitively) makes it harder for people to contribute updates and/or patches.

For example, I work for Google and we have specific rules about which repos we can contribute to. Generally speaking, all of the standard open source licenses explicitly grant three specific rights: reproduction, modification, and distribution.

Here’s the counterintuitive part: Public domain and other unlicenses could lead to copyrighted versions of the same work. Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is in the public domain, but a specific production’s script (with language edits, stage blocking, etc.) is a freshly copyrighted work.

I’d love to contribute patches (e.g. to make the web IDE work better on smaller screens), but can’t do that unless the work is licensed using a recognized open source license: Apache 2, MIT, ISC, etc. All of these ensure that the code remains open for everybody to contribute changes and use the code on an equal footing.

Thanks!

#2

Hi Sarah! Currently, all of the Verilog examples/library are located here: https://github.com/webfpga/verilog. Changes to that repository will reflect onto the production website.

The license for all of the code is MIT – so I’ll begin stripping out the Public Domain notices that exist in some of the comments.

Also, frontend help would be fantastic. I’ll be launching a repo soon to assist with that. It definitely could use some work, but we’ve been focussed on shipping devices non-stop. Almost done!

#3

Hey Ryan :slight_smile:

A quick ping to see if you can put the editor up on Github. It’s not particularly usable on a typical laptop because of the size of the message window. I’d like to clean that up along with some other UX work.

Thanks!

  • S
#4

Hi Ryan!

I’d love to give the project some help so we can support the new people coming onboard. The README on the Verilog samples talks about a new directory structure that’s not in place; is that something I could submit as a PR or will we need to change the editor to accommodate?

Speaking of which, can you upload your editor sources so I can take a look at potential improvements?

Thanks,

  • Sarah
#5

Hey Sarah, stay tuned. We’re working on a significant software/UI push, integrating a lot of features on everyone’s list. This will involve open-sourcing certain components. Should be out by end-of-day tomorrow with a final Kickstarter update to go with it.

Update: Hit some minor snags in development. Will post an update very, very soon.

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