[palata]

Most software developers I know have no clue how open source licences work.

Hell, I have been reading a lot about them (including the licences themselves and stuff like the GPL FAQ) many times, and in situations like this it's still not entirely clear to me what Microsoft should do (surely there are different valid ways to handle this).

Would you consider yourself competent as a lawyer regarding open source licences? If not, can I say that "you apparently never learned it" and aren't better than the rest of us?

[frumplestlatz]

Compliance here is simple — preserve the original license and copyright.

This isn’t complicated, but if you truly don’t understand it then you should speak to a lawyer before incorporating someone else’s code into your or your employer’s project.

[palata]

> Compliance here is simple

Have you read the threads here? My feeling is that there are many mutually exclusive interpretations of what can/should be done.

I don't know if it's simple or not, but what I see is that it's obviously not 100% clear for everybody (me included).

[frumplestlatz]

Ignorance is not a surprise or a fault. Anyone choosing to act from ignorance very much is.

I reiterate that this is not complicated. If you still find it complicated, then you need to speak to an attorney or someone else qualified to give you direction before attempting to use someone else’s code.

We have been doing this for nearly 60 years. Correct examples abound if you’re willing to do basic research.

[palata]

I will reiterate that most developers I know have almost no idea how open source licences work.

[frumplestlatz]

That’s willful ignorance at this point, and they shouldn’t be incorporating open source code into their projects without speaking to an attorney or someone otherwise qualified to answer their questions.