That is great explanation from Linus. Thanks for linking it. He uses AFS (Andrew File System) as an example in that post which I think would be very analogous t

That is great explanation from Linus. Thanks for linking it. He uses AFS (Andrew File System) as an example in that post which I think would be very analogous to ZFS. Linus says > Historically, there's been things like the original Andrew filesystem > module: a standard filesystem that really wasn't written for Linux in > the first place, and just implements a UNIX filesystem. Is that > derived just because it got ported to Linux that had a reasonably > similar VFS interface to what other UNIXes did? Personally, I didn't > feel that I could make that judgment call. Maybe it was, maybe it > wasn't, but it clearly is a gray area. > Personally, I think that case wasn't a derived work, and I was willing > to tell the AFS guys so. So, the ZFS case is not cut and dried either way. It would probably take a court case to clarify the matter as it is in a "gray area". To me, there seems like there is a good chance than ZFS and the Linux Kernel can be distributed as a combined work (But I Am Not A Lawyer!).