HACKER Q&A
📣 ThinkBeat

Can I legally fork C# and share my new version?


I have been trying to find an anwer to this.

Microsoft has opened sourced the C# compiler and dotnetcore.

That ought to mean that if I fork the repos, I can compile the eco system and start making changes.

Create C##.

C## is just a silly name, if the trademark is the problem then lets call it FISH.

Would it be legal under the licence that Microsoft have on the source to then share my C## with the world?

There are a lot of reasons why this would be dumb, but I want to focus on the legal aspect of it. How libre the license is.


  👤 thesuperbigfrog Accepted Answer ✓
I am not a lawyer. If you want legal advice, talk with a lawyer.

Here is the license for the C# compiler (Roslyn): https://github.com/dotnet/roslyn/blob/master/License.txt

The license is an MIT which means that you should be able to fork the language and do anything you want with it.

The names "C#" and ".NET" are Microsoft trademarks and so you would need to use some other name