Commercial Distribution?

[Udo Schröter (Trionic Technologies)]

Hi,

first of all I want to congratulate you on FreeBSD, it is a really cool system!

I have a question regarding the creation of a branded commercial distribution based on FreeBSD.

Here is the thing: my company wants to offer a standard corporate Unix desktop that is certified (guaranteed) to run our enterprise management software well. We looked into Linux but, for various reasons, a solution based on FreeBSD makes more sense for us. Basically we want to release a CD to our customers which installs our own customized FreeBSD environment, with our own brand name. 

If we want to do this, it is clear that we
- must preserve the copyright notices
- should place a description like "based on the FreeBSD Project" on the package
- redistribute GPLed source if modified
- swap out references to freebsd support list in the distro so our customers don't spam the community
- honor the redistribution rules of the ports
- should make a donation to the project as profits allow

Are there any FreeBSD references that MUST be taken out / MUST be left in?
Are there any other legal or technical issues?
How do people on FreeBSD feel about commercial distributions generally?
Are we going to get sued by SCO? (just kidding, sort of)

Your feedback would be very much appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Regards,

Udo

---------------------------
Udo Schröter 
Trionic Technologies GmbH

August-Horch-Strasse 14
67547 Worms (Germany)
Tel: 06241/3029-0
Fax: 06241/3029-10
http://www.trionic.de