[EVO 4G General] sirajperson:
I have been using MIUI for the past several weeks and was interested in it enough to start looking in helping with development when I get the chance. I was surprised to see that there is no source repository for MIUI. In fact, adding WiMax functionality has required the submission of the cyanogen code to the development team to include in a future update of the rom. The Android OS is released under the GPLv2, which clearly states that you must release the source and license of the original code and that if there are any modifications to that code then you must include the dates of the modifications.

GPLv2: section 2

2. You may modify your copy or copies of the Program or any portion of it, thus forming a work based on the Program, and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of Section 1 above, provided that you also meet all of these conditions:

a) You must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change.
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.
c) If the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run, you must cause it, when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way, to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty (or else, saying that you provide a warranty) and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions, and telling the user how to view a copy of this License. (Exception: if the Program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement, your work based on the Program is not required to print an announcement.)
These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.

Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program.

In addition, mere aggregation of another work not based on the Program with the Program (or with a work based on the Program) on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this License.

Full license available at http : // www .gnu .org /licenses/gpl-2.0.html.

If there are some parts of the MIUI rom that has been made independent from the Android OS, then those parts who's source is not released under the GPL must be distributed separately, as per section 2 of the GPLv2.

I have looked all over and it I cannot find any of the source for this ROM. This is in clear violation of the license in witch Android is released.

I feel, personally, that if the MIUI developers are not releasing there source then there is now way for the rest of the community that uses it to know for certain that this software is not malice by nature. It would appear that there is a good number of individuals working on this project, judging by which the speed of improvements are being released. What motivation could a team of people be working under when none of them are interested documenting what they are doing to the public at large. This is, in my opinion, a very dangerous mix. Your phone contains the most sensitive data that you have. As such I would expect the developers of MIUI to include the rest of us in the development process not just for the outstanding improvement of having more people work on a project, but to allow the code of something that is at the center of our private information to be reviewed by the people using it. Is there anyone esle that is concerned about this?