Open-source license?

WisBlock
1

Hello RAK community!

I am planning to use the WisBlock in a commercial application and I will like to know if there is any limitations to do it. What type of open-source license is used for the hardware and software? Do I need any special license? I can’t find any information about this in the RAK webpage.

Thanks for the help :slight_smile:

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Regarding WisBlock open source:
As some of our BSP and libraries are based on open-source code from other parties, you have to check the licenses applied by the creator of the original BSP or library regarding reuse in commercial products.
Where no license or the “The Unlicense” is mentioned, you can use the code without any restrictions.

No license (free to use)

  • WisBlock examples
  • RAK12010-VEML7700-Library
  • RAK13005-TLE7259-Library
  • RAK-RP-Arduino (BSP for Arduino, adapted from Arduino Core BSP, no license mentioned there)

Free to use for commercial products, but licensed:

  • RAK-MQx-Library (The Unlicense)
  • |RAK-ADS7830-Library (MIT license because based on the code of another library with MIT license)
  • RAK14002-CAP1293-Library (MIT license because based on the code of Sparkfun library with MIT license)
  • RAK14001-NCP5623-Library (MIT license because based on the code of another library with MIT license)
  • RAK-nRF52-Arduino (BSP for Arduino, adapted from Adafruit BSP, GNU LGPL)
  • RAK-ESP32-Arduino (BSP for Arduino, adapted from Espressif BSP, GNU LGPL)

Regarding WisBlock open hardware:
The schematics of all our modules are published in our Documentation Center and are free to be used.

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Actually, no license means you can do just about nothing with the code, beyond the bounds of certain exceptions available in copyright laws.

Only an actual license grants the ability to use code.

RAK-RP-Arduino (BSP for Arduino, adapted from Arduino Core BSP, no license mentioned there)

The Arduino core (and by extension all derivatives thereof) are LPGL, which means using it requires serious thought about how to satisfy the replaceability requirement in a statically linked context. Both repositories contain numerous mentions of this in the actual source code.

https://support.arduino.cc/hc/en-us/articles/360018434279-I-have-used-Arduino-for-my-project-do-I-need-to-release-my-source-code-

Given that the classic Arduino build process typically and (and unusually!) merges all sources into a single compilation unit, object re-linking would be extremely difficult (some of the more complex platforms might possible do this a little differently?)

In practice, license-compliant Arduino-based products end up being open source.

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@cstratton @Civilduino

Chris is correct, no license means that you cannot use the code. Sorry for my wrong answer, I learned something new.

And because of this, we updated our repositories and the libraries created by RAKwireless are now under MIT license.

Regarding the BSP’s they are distributed under various license terms which can be found in the respective GitHub repos.

Even RAKwireless repos like WisBlock (examples and tutorials) are distributed under MIT license, they might use other libraries that are distributed under more restrictive licenses. You need to check for the licenses of libraries used in the examples.

This is not a legal advice and we suggest that you conduct an independant research and verify the applicable license terms of libraries, BSP’s and examples codes that you use in your final application.

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