Compatible licenses for MASM32 projects?

[BlueMR2]

Obviously the GPL is out as specified in the FAQ (fine with me, I hate the GPL, it's an evil, evil license that we unfortunately have been burdened with for so many projects).  However, I didn't see mention of any licenses that *are* known compatible?  Would the MIT license (my current preferred) be compatible with the MASM32 license?

[hutch--]

While I simply don't know what an MIT licence contains, the MASM32 licence is very clear about its own status, it is an exclusive licence that garantees that the SDK will only ever be freeware and that it cannot be absorbed or canibalised by any other licencing system. To this extent it is completely incompatible with any other licencing system.

What it DOES do is make you personally the owner of the software you write and that you have the right to sell it, give it away and use it as you choose without having to give credit to anyone or to make your code available to anyone. You treat the MASM32 SDK like you treat commercial software, it cannot be re-licenced at all but what you produce with it is your own property so if you need a licence, write your own to control the software that you write.

[anta40]

What about WTFPL?

DO WHAT THE F*CK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
                    Version 2, December 2004

Copyright (C) 2004 Sam Hocevar <sam@hocevar.net>

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim or modified
copies of this license document, and changing it is allowed as long
as the name is changed.

            DO WHAT THE F*CK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
   TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION

  0. You just DO WHAT THE F*CK YOU WANT TO.

Strangely, it is compatible with GPL, though  :P

[BlueMR2]

While I simply don't know what an MIT licence contains, the MASM32 licence is very clear about its own status, it is an exclusive licence that garantees that the SDK will only ever be freeware and that it cannot be absorbed or canibalised by any other licencing system. To this extent it is completely incompatible with any other licencing system.

What it DOES do is make you personally the owner of the software you write and that you have the right to sell it, give it away and use it as you choose without having to give credit to anyone or to make your code available to anyone. You treat the MASM32 SDK like you treat commercial software, it cannot be re-licenced at all but what you produce with it is your own property so if you need a licence, write your own to control the software that you write.

OK.  The goal is to do some experimentation with some code, but have it on github to share with some friends.  However, that gives *everyone* access to it (for read anyways, I might perhaps let a friend or 2 commit to the project, but will NOT be accepting the general public!).  I'm fine with people reading my code, but since it's purely experimental and won't be solid code I was trying to find a license to ward off lawsuits from stupid people (the "I ran your codez and my computer blowed up so imma sue you" people), yet I obviously have to adhere to the MASM32 license.  :-)  In place of a standard license I've tagged the code as being developed with your MASM32, and therefore is subject to all requirements thereof.  Also threw in a note that it is experimental software designed for my very specific platform and not compatible with others.  I feel reasonably good about that.  :-)

[hutch--]

The trick is to write your own licence. As you own what you write with MASM32, you specify the conditions by which someone else can use it.

1. Use this code at your own risk after evaluating it.
2. If you are not confident that you can evaluate this code to suit your purpose, do not use it.
3. You have the right to use and share this code only if you fully comply with the licence.
4. etc etc ....

The MASM32 licence was designed in this manner to ensure that no-one could force an author using MASM32 to publish their code if they did not want to do so. It is garranteed freeware written by many people over time including myself as enabling software for programmers to write what they like in MASM without being subject to crap like CopyLeft, CopyWrong or any other semantic bullsh*t that takes ownership of your code.

As far as sharing code with others, thats fine, we have been doing it here for years and the licence does not interfere with people working in combination to build larger projects.

The MASM32 SDK has no debt to any organisation like the GNU or similar systems and does not use any of their code at all. It does provide some very old Microsoft binaries under licence from Microsoft and the MASM32 licence among other things protects the original Microsoft EULA by ensuring that its conditions are not violated by unrelated organisations that attempt to parasitically take ownership of other peoples/companies property.